Every now and again, you have an "aha moment"—it's that second something that has long eluded you finally becomes crystal clear.
It's a powerful moment to experience for oneself—and even more powerful when it happens for several people simultaneously. I got to witness one of those powerful moments when a whole roomful of people had an aha moment all at the same time.
It came during a breakout session on Consumer Financial Protection Bureau's examination of overdraft fees and small-dollar lending at CUNA's Governmental Affairs Conference last month. In the middle of the session, CFPB Assistant Director Corey Stone, apparently confused about why so many CUs in the room were concerned about this, asked, "are you all over $10 billion in assets?" Several in the crowd retorted, "but it affects all of us!"
And there it was, that aha moment when everybody in the room realized that for all that the CFPB has said that it recognizes that credit unions are different, it doesn't understand one key reason for that difference: the cooperative structure, not just of individual CUs, but of the entire industry—it's why die hards insist on referring to it as a "movement" not merely an "industry."
Sure, CFPB only directly regulates credit unions with more than $10 billion in assets. But what affects those institutions eventually trickles down to even the smallest of CUs—and for them, the burden is all the greater, as they are too small to have a dedicated compliance officer (much less an entire department dedicated to compliance).
When National CU Foundation Executive Director and former NCUA Board Member Gigi Hyland, who sat on the panel with Stone, asked Washington State Employees CU CEO Kevin Foster-Keddie to explain to Stone why things that affect the largest CUs also has an impact on everybody else, Foster-Keddie declined to jump into the fray other than to say, "I'm surprised that you think it doesn't."
Unfortunately, the jury is still out on whether Stone—and, through him, the CFPB—also experienced an aha moment as a result of that exchange.
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