TAMPA, Fla. – Fast-growing Grow Financial FCU said this morning it plans to open three branches in South Carolina this year and next and as many as 15 branches in the future in the Palmetto State, where it sees a fertile market.

FARMINGTON HILLS, Mich. – John Burnell, former board chairman and director for more than 30 years at Community Choice CU and its predecessor, passed away.

POCATELLO, Idaho – A former teller at Westmark CU on Friday pleaded guilty to one count of embezzlement by a credit union employee after she admitted to taking about $23,625 from member accounts.

LEAVENWORTH, Kan. – Frontier Community FCU has signed with MShift for mobile banking services, including mobile browser banking and downloadable apps for iPhone, and Android, through a partnership with MShift and CSCU.

BURLINGTON, Vt. – Vermont FCU has purchased a long-vacant property in Middlebury, Vt., that used to house a branch of Chittenden Bank.

NOTRE DAME, Ind. – Notre Dame FCU said its promotion to save members money by transferring their existing credit card loans to a Notre Dame FCU Visa Platinum credit card at 0% for six months and 7.9% thereafter attracted $3.2 million in new loans.

BASKING RIDGE, N.J. – Affinity FCU has chosen INVEST Financial Corp. to provide its members with brokerage and investment services.

OMAHA, Neb. – Credit unions in Nebraska are getting ready to celebrate their first Save to Win savings sweepstakes with the choosing of the $25,000 grand prize winner.

TOPEKA, Kan. – The longtime CEO of a tiny rural credit union who said she stole from the credit union to save the family farm has been sentenced to three years in prison.

WASHINGTON – Sparks are expected to fly Thursday when Richard Cordray, director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, and several bank regulators are scheduled for a hearing before the Senate Banking Committee on the progress of the Dodd-Frank Act – just as Cordray’s future at the fledgling agency is in question.

MERIDEN, Conn. – The CU League of Connecticut will not be open today, and not because Tony Emerson and staff did not want to try.

WASHINGTON – NCUA told a congressional committee that a government-wide ban on contingency legal arrangements does not apply to suits it has brought against Wall Street banks over the failure of the corporate credit unions because as liquidating agents for the corporates it is not acting as a “government agency.”

ONTARIO, Calif.-The California league and CURoots Cooperative are in discussions to transfer ownership of CURoots to the California League Services Corp.

NCUA Says Rules Are Coming On Derivatives

ALEXANDRIA, Va.-NCUA has issued prohibition orders against:

Three employees of Central Missouri Community CU recently raisedn money for a local nonprofit, HELP Services, by participating in a Polar Bear Plunge at Carrollton Recreational Lake.

MADISON, Wis.-The Filene Research Institute has released a new report that urges CUs to engage members through tablet and smartphone apps and to stay abreast of those devices' adoptions.

Membership growth slowed in December from its record pace, but not until credit unions across the nation added a near all-time best of about 2.4 million members for 2012, according to preliminary estimates by CUNA.

It can be easy to show good numbers following a merger, especially if absorbing a small credit union. What takes more work is creating a culture to hit those numbers organically.

For small to medium-size credit unions, whether to pursue a merger is an ongoing discussion. One person with a lot of experience in that arena reports that mergers have certainly made easier the job of driving growth.