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We were delighted to be joined by nearly 50 advocates from 24 different credit unions in Washington, D.C. for our annual Hike the Hill.

We were grateful to meet with nearly 40 congressional offices, including all six Senate offices, to discuss credit union priorities and advocate on behalf of the 10 million members across Alabama, Florida, and Georgia. Our top priorities included the Credit Card Competition Act, the Overdraft Protection Act, the Expanding Financial Access for Underserved Communities Act, the Board Modernization Act, and the Community Development Financial Institutions Fund. Following credit union advocacy last week, field of membership legislation (the Senate version of the Expanding Financial Access for Underserved Communities Act) was introduced this week in the Senate and we left with a number of legislative leads and future cosponsors.

We participated in regulatory meetings with CFPB Director Chopra, where we indicated the importance of fees and why it should be up to each respective financial institution to implement changes that best benefit their members, as well as our opposition to expanding fraud-related definitions under Regulation E. As financial institutions currently bear the cost when a breach or scam occurs, the CFPB should be more concerned with educating consumers, peer-to-peer payment systems, retailers, and others on securing data and protecting consumers against bad actors. Director Chopra was receptive to our feedback and highlighted the unique differences of the cooperative structure.

Additionally, we met with NCUA Chairman Todd Harper and Vice Chairman Kyle Hauptman to ensure the NCUA to discuss key regulatory issues. Due to the NCUA’s recent push to gain third party vendor authority, we shared several reasons why this legislation is unnecessary and how the agency currently lacks the bandwidth and expertise to examine vendors. As it relates to the NCUA’s current proposed rule on Succession Planning, we shared our opposition to mandating another requirement instead of sharing guidance as a best practice.

For two weeks in September, credit union advocates in all three states within LSCU’s footprint met with forty-four members of Congress and the US Senate for our 2020 Virtual Hike the Hill. While the format of the event changed, the goal remained the same: to remind our lawmakers of the great work credit unions have been doing in their communities despite the specific challenges of the pandemic and to update them on the status of our legislative issues. During both weeks, credit union leaders brought to their attention the assistance that credit unions have been providing to their members during the pandemic and the thoughtful and personalized initiatives that have made a lasting impact in their districts (like the Credit Unions Care Challenge). We urged them to support the Paycheck Protection Program Small Business Forgiveness Act (H.R. 7777 and S. 4117) and any other legislation involving PPP forgiveness. We also informed them of our legislative priorities, including merchant data breach liability and preserving the credit union tax exemption.