Skip to main content

What 'CU' Can Also Stand For, and Another Lesson Learned This Week - By Frank J. Diekmann - CUToday

 By Frank J. Diekmann - Frank is a Keynote speaker at this year's New Orleans Conference.

Diekmann 2.0 Vertical

As I was placing my bag in the trunk of my Uber at the San Antonio airport last week, I couldn’t help noting his license tag began with “CU.” Occupational hazard, I suppose, but I immediately wondered if he was a member or had worked at a credit union, or, who knows, maybe a CU had financed the car.

Two minutes into the ride downtown—thank you, San Antonio, for not only not burying your river in a pipe but also for having an airport that isn’t another flight away from the city center—the driver asked the Uber-driver-mandated question about why I was in town.

“I’m here to speak to a credit union conference,” I responded.

And given the license plate, this is where I expected him to start talking all things credit union. San Antonio is, after all, among the strongest markets for credit unions in the country, with major CUs such as Randolph-Brooks, Security Service, United Texas, PenFed, Firstmark, and, fittingly, Alamo City among the high-profile brands in the market, along with many others.

“Oh. Are there credit unions in San Antonio?” he asked. 

We were driving past the office tower headquarters of Credit Human Credit Union at the time, by the way.

Realizing the “CU” on the license plate was not some sort of endorsement for financial co-ops (or even knowledge of them), and perhaps an abbreviation for Clueless Uber, I explained that there are indeed quite a few credit unions in the San Antonio market and that he might want to try one.

The moral of the story (once again): You just can’t tell your story often enough.

One more thing: As we approached my hotel a commercial came on the radio in which the announcer in a car commercial—as required by law--shouted, “Buy American! Buy Dodge!” Which was interesting, since Dodge is now owned by Stellantis, which is based in Amsterdam. 

The moral of that story, as we’ve all sadly come to learn in recent years: If you say something false often enough, it becomes true.

The Importance of Story Telling

A day after speaking the Education Credit Union Council meeting, I had the additional pleasure during NAFCU’s Strategic Growth Conference in Greenville, S.C., of getting to moderate a very interesting panel session on how credit unions are using social media.

While there, I had lunch with a group of credit union leaders, one of whom had only recently joined Truliant FCU in North Carolina. 

When I mentioned that his credit union had been the linchpin in one of most consequential events in U.S. credit union history, an event that changed the course of the entire industry in ways both positive and negative, he admitted he had no idea what I was talking about. (And I admit, I get that a lot.)

Screen Shot 2022-03-30 at 2.54.41 PM

So, I explained the credit union’s history, back when it was still known at AT&T Family FCU and when in the early 1990s it had expanded its “field” of membership outside of the core sponsor. That led, of course, to a lawsuit filed by the banking industry that went all the way to the Supreme Court, where credit unions lost their case after the high court ruled the FCU Act said “group,” not “groups” when it came to field of membership. 

The decision was followed by a massive grassroots lobbying effort by a rather inexperienced credit union community that still fought and scraped and rallied enough support in Congress for a landslide vote to pass the Credit Union Membership Access Act, opening the way to the widely expanded charters we see today and a roadside littered with the bodies of CUs that never adjusted and a road full of multi-billion-dollar CUs that did.

That’s another story worth telling, and not just to the newbies at Truliant.

Can’t Be Forgotten

History should never be forgotten, as that’s where all the lessons lie. I thought about that again this week with the news Jim McCormack had died. Mr. McCormack was the president of the then Pennsylvania Credit Union League and was invaluable in working with then Rep. Paul Kanjorski (D-PA), who co-sponsored the CU Membership Act and who helped shepherd it through Congress (where it got out of committee by one vote).

Had McCormack and Kanjorski and so many countless, countless others who stuffed envelopes and held signs and made phone calls not pushed the stone up the mountain against a banking industry always working to kick it back down, then it wouldn’t just be the occasional Uber driver unaware of what credit unions are, it would be an Uber XL fleet of Americans also ignorant of the same.

That history and those people must never be forgotten.

Frank J. Diekmann is Cooperator in Chief of CUToday.info and can be reached at Frank@CUToday.info. Mr. Diekmann is also author of  several new book, including the brand new “The Last Lyric,” a humorous satire about a murder investigation at the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in which every line of dialogue is either a classic pop/rock song title or lyric. Available on Amazon, Apple iBook, Barnes & Noble and Smashwords.  Mr. Diekmann is also author of a non-fiction compilation of the very best & worst he has seen and heard in covering more than 500 CU meetings and conferences, “501 Name Tags: How Everything You Need to Know About Business Can Be Learned at a Conference & Forgotten in the Trade Show.” It is available on AmazonBarnes & NobleAppleLulu, and Smashwords.   

2 Books Use Me

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

NCOFCU Newsletter

The Bucket Coach is a financial advice book designed by Fire Services Credit Union, Tronto, Canada. and written exclusively for Fire Fighters It's a practical guide for household financial management, including investments, credit and mortgages, and retirement. Developed with contributions from Fire Fighters," NCOFCU Newsletter : " Kevin Connolly Chief Executive Officer    Fire Services Credit Union Phone: 416-440-1294 ext 301  Toll Free: 1-866-833-3285 E-mail:  kevin@firecreditunion.ca 1997 Avenue Rd Toronto, ON M5M 4A3 

Sunday Reading - What is the Dow Jones?

    What is the Dow Jones? Created in 1896, the Dow Jones Industrial Average is one of the world’s oldest and most widely recognized stock indexes—a measure tracking the stock performance of a selected group of companies ( see most recent data ). Originally designed to track America’s leading industrial firms, the Dow has evolved into a cultural and financial shorthand for the health of the US economy. As of 2025, it measures 30 major companies —like McDonald's, Boeing, and Nike—across sectors such as technology, healthcare, finance, and consumer goods.  Unlike most modern indexes, which are weighted by the total value of a company’s shares, the DJIA uses a price-weighted formula —meaning stocks with higher share prices exert more influence, regardless of company size. The DJIA has been updated 59 times since its creation to reflect changes in the US economy ( see ch...

New from AutoLink

New from AutoLink

The Role and Hazards of an Interim Executive

  The Role and Hazards of an Interim Executive Leadership transitions are rarely smooth. A change at the top can trigger uncertainty, speculation, and anxiety. Staff worry about their jobs, members wonder about continuity, and boards feel the weight of stewarding the organization through uncertain change. The utilization of an interim executive director is meant to stabilize the organization and allow the board enough space and capacity to find the right successor leader. Here’s a catch: if an interim executive is also a candidate for the successor role, the very purpose of an interim engagement is compromised. With an Interim, there’s always a second wave of anxiety Every leadership transition comes with some anxiety. The staff sometimes don’t know what’s going on. The board is worried about continuity, and members may be worried about joining. One task of an interim is to absorb some of that anxiety and provide reassurance that things are moving forward. But there is al...

Powell Rejects Any Plan for Fed to Intervene in Secondary Market to Bring Down Rates

  Frank Diekmann October 20, 2025 2:22 am No Comments PHILADELPHIA–Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell said there are no plans for the central bank to directly intervene in secondary mortgage markets in an attempt to help bring down mortgage rates, an idea some have proposed as a means of addressing the affordability crisis In housing. Jerome Powell Speaking at the  National Association for Business Economics  conference in Philadelphia, Powell spoke to the Fed’s progress with “quantitative tightening,” that is, its work to reduce the more than $6 trillion of securities it holds on its  balance sheet . Read more about the Balance Sheet HERE Those holdings include approximately $2 trillion in mortgage-backed securities (MBS), which are bundles of home loans that are packaged together and sold to investors, usually by middlemen  Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac , noted Realtor.com. Rolling Off Balance Sheet As the report noted, the Fed dramatically increased M...

Fed Chair Says Strength of Economy Allowing it to be Patient With Any Rate Cuts

WASHINGTON–Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell said the strength of the economy is giving the central bank flexibility to be patient when it comes to cutting rates. Jerome Powell This year has been filled with predictions over when the Fed will move to reduce rates, including by credit union economists. But inflation has been more stubborn than many had forecast, and most now say it will be June at the earliest before the Fed makes any move. Last week, a new report showed inflation in February was 2.5%, far below the 7% peak seen in 2022 and closer to the Fed’s 2% target. In an interview last week with the National Public Radio’s Marketplace program, P...

How Stablecoins Could Prove to Be Anything But Stable for CUs That Don’t Get Moving

LOST PINES, Texas–With the GENIUS Act enacted and the countdown on for NCUA and regulators to get rules in place for stablecoins, credit unions were told it’s “go time” to begin preparing for a new technology that could “eat the lunch” of interchange. The cautionary words came from  Dr. Lamont Black , an associate professor at the Driehaus College of Business at DePaul University, where among other things he teaches a graduate course on cryptocurrency, and who is also a fellow in Filene’s Credit Union of the Future Center of Excellence, and who s well-known to many in credit unions for his work and insights.  After several years of speaking to credit unions on crypto, he told  Catalyst Corporate’s  Strategic Summit meeting he has pivoted now due to the rapid change taking place, and in addition to talking about AI (see separate reporting in the CU Daily), he has a warning for CUs when it comes to another emerging technology. Eating the Lunch of Payments “I believe st...

Zelle Says It Will Allow Users to Make International Payments Using Stablecoins

SCOTTSDALE, Ariz .–   Zelle  has announced plans to allow users to start making international payments using stablecoins. The move by Early Warning Services, which operates the P2P payments network Zelle and which is owned by a consortium of large banks, comes in the wake of the passage of the GENIUS Act, which is designed to usher stablecoins into the regulated financial system. Stablecoins are a digital currency that is pegged to a fiat currency such as the U.S. dollar. As the CU Daily reported  here , credit unions were strongly urged during an event last week to not just start paying attention to stablecoins but to begin taking action as interchange income is threatened. Similarly, analysts said the move by Zelle to help users move money across borders is a defensive move in response to what is expected to be the growing use of stablecoins by consumers and businesses. Early Warning Services did not indicate how it would work or when it would launch, according to sever...

Your Credit Union CAN Use Public Fund Deposits To Fund Assets

By Corporate One Federal Credit Union Once largely thought of as taboo, the use of external funding is now widely accepted throughout the credit union industry. In fact, the NCUA has required all credit unions to seek multiple liquidity sources and document those sources in their liquidity policy. As the acceptance of external funding has improved, credit unions are increasingly sourcing funds from many channels, including the Federal Home Loan Bank System, the corporate credit union network, and several non-member deposit channels, such as public fund deposits. Yes, public fund deposits are being increasingly sourced to fund credit union assets. Increasing Growth, Benefits, And Uses Total member and non-member government deposits totaled $5.4 billion at year-end 2017. This is an increase of 27% since 2015. While this amount pales in comparison to total deposits and other liabilities, how important are these deposits to the nearly 500 credit unions who report them?...

No Bonuses, No Problem: Why Credit Unions Are Rethinking Incentive Models

Cooperatives across the country are taking a fresh look at employee motivation, with some moving toward a more holistic approach to compensation. Marc Rapport Point/Counterpoint: This story is part of Callahan’s new “Point/Counterpoint” series, examining credit union issues from multiple perspectives. Want a different take on incentives? Learn how two credit unions align staff efforts with organizational goals to boost the bottom line and enhance member value in “Incentives That Power Performance And Improve Outcomes.” Top-Level Takeaways Capital Credit Union’s transition away from individual performance-based incentives has resulted in improved employee engagement, lower turnover, and better member service. Seattle Credit Union is still evaluating the effectiveness of incentive programs, balancing ...