Vandals Strike CU Activist

VANCOUVER, Wash. – Vandals spray-painted the letters CCU all over the outside of the house of former Columbia CU director Cathryn Chudy, who helped turn back a proposal to convert the $700 million credit union to a savings bank. Chudy and her sometime fiancé Lloyd Marbet was expelled from Columbia CU a year ago, after a three-year fight to defeat the conversion and open the credit union’s books. The vandals used white spray-paint to print the letters CCU on all of the windows on Chudy’s house sometime Friday night. Police said they are investigating the incident. A lawyer for Chudy said because she has an unlisted phone number, and given the nature of the vandalism, there are reasons to believe that the vandals may have obtained her home address from the credit union’s confidential records. Chudy and Marbet were among the organizers of Save Columbia CU, the first members group to successfully force the withdrawal of a credit union conversion. The group went on to gain control of the Columbia CU board, only to splinter over the continued efforts to open the credit union’s books, culminating in last year’s expulsion of Chudy, Marbet and two other members of the group from the credit union’s volunteer governance.