The National Association of Federal Credit Unions (NAFCU) on Friday said its membership voted to approve its board's unanimous recommendation to amend the association's Articles of Incorporation to grant full voting rights to all federally insured, state-chartered members.
The trade group said the decision includes the ability to run for and serve on the NAFCU board of directors. "It also reinforces NAFCU's focus on credit union issues at the federal level," NAFCU said in a statement.
"This decision is vital to the growth and success of NAFCU, and supports our goal of serving all federally insured credit unions at the federal level so we may become a stronger, more impactful organization," said Richard Harris, chair of the NAFCU Board of Directors. "While this is great news for NAFCU and the industry, we remain focused on providing our members the best in federal advocacy, education and compliance assistance."
"NAFCU's board, staff and I are pleased with the membership's decision to grant federally insured, state-chartered members full voting rights," said Dan Berger, NAFCU's president and CEO. "State-chartered members make up an important and growing part of our membership. We expect state-chartered membership to grow even further with this decision."
"Allowing state-chartered members to vote and sit on the board further strengthens our voice and ability to best represent our members before Congress, the NCUA, the CFPB and other key policymakers at the federal level," Harris added. "Our state-chartered members are now eligible to participate in the 2017 election cycle for the NAFCU board of directors."
NAFCU said it commissioned an independent, third-party elections company, Election-America, to administer the vote. Election-America helps to manage elections for trade associations and credit unions.
