Credit Union Times - Centennial Edition - (Page I28) CeLeBrAtiNg 100 YeArS , SPeCiAL CeNteNNiAL editioN Hispanic, Asian roots Help Ceos Build trust With Members By MicHelle a. saMaaD CU Times Senior Staff Reporter ROCHESTER, N.Y. — Melissa Marquez can remember the childhood moments when she knew she would be forever linked to credit unions. She grew up in a Mexican household where her dad, an airline industry worker, opened CU savings accounts for her and six siblings and her mother was a bank officer. There were days Marquez’ mother would come home in tears because of the way Mexicans were treated at her job during pre-Community Reinvestment Act days in California. “She knew they were able to pay off the loans they would apply for. She would hear things like ‘dirty Mexicans.’ I really believed my mom influenced me away from banks,” Marquez recalled. As president/CEO of $7.7 million Genesee Co-op Federal Credit Union, Marquez has come full circle advocating how credit unions have a litany of opportunities to extend service “among the richness of diverse groups.” Extending fields of membership, hiring multilingual staff and tailoring marketing to different ethnicities is sure to reap dividends, she said. “If you go back 100 years ago when people were organizing, their mission was to make credit available to those who were not able to get it. It’s one of the duties of credit unions,” Marquez said. Genesee Co-op FCU has a sundry membership of about 2,500 that includes Sudanese and Somalian refugees, residents of the economically and racially diverse city of Rochester and the remaining segment from former food co-op users for whom the credit union was originally founded. Prior to Genesee, Marquez headed Progressive Neighborhood, another Rochester-based CU with a large African-American member base. Since Genesee’s members are from all ethnic walks of life, Marquez hired a staffer who speaks five languages. Now a part-time worker, he recently got a full-time job in the school system. Marquez said she is well aware of the challenges that extend beyond marketing. “One of the challenges is lending to people with ‘clean’ credit. That’s not to say that people of color or refugees don’t have the potential to have clean credit, but [because they’re new to the credit system] they may not have it yet,” Marquez said. Drawing from her own experiences, Marquez said her Mexican heritage has helped other minorities identify with her when they walk through the credit union door. Many are comfortable talking to a woman of color, she explained. Most are not ashamed to talk to her and Genesee’s staff if they have been laid off from a job or if Once serving a large Asian they are afraid of losing population, Northeast their home because of Community FCU has the subprime market expanded to Africancrash. On the other end American and Hispanic of the spectrum, she is communities. Michael Chan hopeful about where the was one of the credit industry is going as it union’s early organizers. starts have a more diverse reflection. One entity advocating that effort is the Network of Latino Credit Unions and Professionals of which Marquez is a member. “I feel that it’s an important milestone to continue raising the issues affecting change much in the same way the African-American Credit Union Coalition has done,” Marquez said. “It can only strengthen the potential for growth, be it through Latinos, refugees or immigrants from Central and South America, Mexico and African countries.” On the other side of the country, Michael Chan was then of being victimized,” Chan said. “It was important for them to feel comfortable doing business in their native language.” The need to build that trust stemmed from several historical periods of mistrust, Chan said. After the Chinese came over during the gold rush and worked on railroads, the U.S. implemented a plan to exclude and seclude them. As a child, Chan said he remembers that segregation period. It wasn’t until the discriminatory laws were struck down around World War II did substantive changes occur, Chan recalled. Chinatown in San Francisco experienced a population boom in the 1960s and 1970s. The growth of nonprofits in the area, coupled with later partnerships with Patelco CU and even some local banks, helped Northeast reach more Asians. A field of membership expansion in 2004 brought in surrounding Hispanic and African-American communities. Today, the credit union has about $8.7 million in assets and 1,500 members. “Word of mouth has helped us. We’re often the lender of last resort. Our task is to be able to retain them,” Chan said. “We don’t have to focus on just micro-enterprise loans. We can do large loans that have a greater impact on the community.” Even as the intertwined membership of Asians, AfricanAmericans and Hispanics has not been an issue among the three, Chan said there are other groups that seek a second chance, such as the homeless trying to get back on their feet or those coming out of the prison system. “We want to go to those areas where there is definitely a need.” —msamaad@cutimes.com With a diverse staff, including a former full-time worker who speaks five languages, members are comfortable sharing their stories, said Melissa Marquez, president/CEO of Genesee Co-op FCU, pictured second from the right standing. one of the early organizers of San Francisco-based Northeast Community FCU in the late 1970s and now serves as its chairman. The CU grew from a shutout of Vietnamese and Chinese refugees from local banks. Chan said there was certainly an untapped market here because the Asian community’s core values are built on homeownership, education and entrepreneurship. Many Vietnamese were familiar with the credit union model from cooperatives in their native country. “The challenges were a lack of English and a financial literacy gap. They were fearful of not knowing and Women, African-American Pioneers Have Helped Sew CUs’ Patchwork By MicHelle a. saMaaD CU Times Senior Staff Reporter TALLAHASSEE, Fla. — Aletta Shutes, executive vice president of the Florida Credit Union League, found that building alliances early in one’s career can smooth the sometimes bumpy ride women experience as they rise up through the ranks. Shutes began as a stenographer in Florida state government and 33 years later became the first career service woman to be appointed secretary of administration by then Gov. Bob Martinez in 1989. She served in that role until 1991 and was instrumental in helping to pass Florida’s Taxpayers’ Bill of Rights. Shutes has also served at the Florida Department of Revenue and was deputy secretary of labor and employment security before coming to the league. Along the way, she formed lifelong connections. “I had a record of helping people,” Shutes said. “When you help someone, they never forget you. I’ve always went to bat for the little person.” According to CUNA, nearly 70% of staffers at credit unions are women compared with roughly 50% at banks. More than a dozen of the country’s billion-dollar CUs are headed by women CEOs. Throughout the movement’s history, women have played pivotal roles in helping to organize credit unions, serving as volunteers and as managers in the early years. While exact figures are hard to pinpoint on the number of women in senior positions at leagues, Shutes said even though a glass ceiling exists in some industries, Florida has seen success in this area at both credit unions and banks. She points to friend Alex Sink, a former president of Bank of America, now chief financial officer of the Florida Department of Financial Services. “I think it’s very important to see women in leadership and executive roles within the credit union industry,” Shutes said. “Women bring a balance that maybe men can’t. Women have intuitive strengths.” In her early career days, she was often the only woman in the office but that never fazed Shutes, the Aletta Shutes (left) counts Alex Sink, a former president at Bank of America, now chief financial officer of the Florida Department of Financial Services, among her close friends. They are pictured here with Guy Hood, president of the Florida CU League. only girl in a family of five brothers. Shutes’ ability to jockey for position has helped Florida credit unions to become more active politically. When she came to the league in 1993, the most its political action committee had raised was $19,000. Shutes soon went to work encouraging credit unions to build relationships with state and local elected officials. In 2007, she raised more than $620,000 for the league’s political action committee and received CUNA’s Buck Levins award for political involvement that year. “A lot of people have the opinion that lobbyists walk around with money in their pocket. I try to get credit unions to understand that laws passed affect your personal life too: from zoning factors to taxes,” Shutes said. (Continued on page 29) www.cutimes.com Credit Union Times, December 2008 http://www.cutimes.com
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