Credit Union Board Modernization Act

Floor Speech

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Mr. HUIZENGA. Mr. Speaker, I thank Chairman McHenry for yielding me time this afternoon.

I rise today in support of the Credit Union Board Modernization Act and ask for its immediate passage.

Credit unions can play an important role in many of our local communities, often working with families and small business owners to gain access to credit.

H.R. 582 will go a long way to providing reasonable regulatory relief for credit unions, especially in Michigan's Fourth Congressional District and across the Nation.

Mr. Speaker, if signed into law, these commonsense, reasonable reforms will allow federally chartered credit unions in good standing in Michigan and across the country the same reasonable governance practices afforded to those at the State level.

Currently, all federally chartered credit union boards must meet at least once month. This one-size-fits-all requirement often negatively impacts smaller rural credit unions, which ultimately impacts, frankly, which members are willing to even serve on those boards and therefore the services that they can and will be able to provide to their local community.

The Credit Union Board Modernization Act rightly modernizes how often federally chartered credit union boards must meet, which the National Credit Union Administration currently mandates to be monthly. Nothing in this legislation prevents a credit union from meeting more than six times a year. It just gives them the flexibility and they are able to then decide. That is the idea of a credit union; member-driven, they will decide.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the sponsor of this bill, the gentleman from California (Mr. Vargas) for working with Republicans, and specifically me, this last Congress to implement these reasonable safeguards.

I do want to note, specifically, this legislation does not apply to new credit unions or those credit unions with low exam ratings, as the chair had indicated. Highly rated credit unions with high management ratings must hold at least six meetings annually, with at least one meeting held during each fiscal quarter.

Alternatively, these lower-rated credit unions must continue to meet once a month, and there will be direction on that, as the chair has outlined.

I want to be clear. This bill does not give credit unions an advantage over their community bank counterparts but brings parity to an outdated process.

Again, I thank Congressman Vargas for his commitment to make this a bipartisan effort. I look forward to seeing these reforms, which will strengthen local economies across the Nation, enacted into law.

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