Content area
Full text
CUNA leader reflects on the strength of CUNA and the CU movement
In March, CUNA President/CEO Bill Cheney announced he would be stepping down to become the new CEO at SchoolsFirst Federal Credit Union in Santa Ana, Calif.
As Bill concludes his tenure at CUNA next month, Credit Union Magazine asked him to reflect on the accomplishments and memories of his term in office.
What were CUNA's most significant accomplishments during your tenure as CEO?
Looking back on the past four years, we've made some important progress. But without a doubt, protecting the credit union tax exemption was the most impactful. Good defense is not what scores points-at least not on a regular basis-but it can win games.
I'm incredibly proud of the way the team at CUNA, the leagues, and our member credit unions-and their members-rallied behind this effort. Lawmakers heard from us at every level-more than 1.3 million contacts. That's impossible to ignore. So by far I would say the Don't Tax My Credit Union effort was a big win for CUNA.
We've also built on CUNA's longstanding position as a political powerhouse. The combination of our leagues' efforts at the state level and the constant engagement on legislative and regulatory efforts at the national level gives us tremendous strength and credibility with policymakers in Washington, D.C.
Last year was our best off-election year ever for contributions to our political action committee, CULAC (Credit Union Legislative Action Council). We've made it clear that we support candidates who support credit unions. And that has allowed us to have very meaningful dialogue as candidates gear up for the 2014 elections.
On a broader basis, looking at these past four years, I think we've energized the movement. Our largest group of supporters-4,400- come to Washington, D.C., in February for our Governmental Affairs Conference (GAC). There's a palpable vitality emerging with hundreds of thousands of Americans joining our movement each year- discovering that credit unions are their best financial partner. We set that as our vision and created tools and programs to support it. And it's renewing the credit union movement in a...