JOHNSTOWN, Penn.-Three board members at USSCO Johnstown FCU here got another chance to save their seats, and they took full advantage by winning a re-vote after the first election was thrown out.
A member notification glitch resulted in the invalidation of May's election and a re-vote on Aug. 12. In the first contested election since the $98-million credit union was founded in 1959, three challengers running as a slate won seats by a margin of just six votes. But it was later discovered that more than 300 of the credit union's 13,700 members were not notified of the election. Members with very low activity in their accounts were only sent annual statements, while the election notices were sent in quarterly statements.
USSCO Johnstown's attorney, Guy Messick, told Credit Union Journal over the summer he had no choice but to invalidate the election because of this oversight.
Following the controversy, the credit union re-scheduled the vote for August and sent out special annual meeting statements to those 300 or so members who did not receive notice the first time. With the entire membership body well-notified of the election, Margaret Miller, Gerald Smith and Richard Wilson were able to flip the previous results and each won re-election to another three year term.
Surprisingly, the margin was not even close, as Miller won 280 votes and Smith and Wilson each earned 276 votes. Thet top vote-getter for the challengers was Dom Cannizzaro, who only picked up 30 votes.
