From our Chairman
It’s Our Responsibility to Tell
“You can’t ignore politics, no matter how much you’d like to.”
J.R. Buckner, MBA Chairman First Federal Bank of Kansas City
Tis sentiment from the late American journalist Molly Ivins aptly summarizes how the vast majority of us feel about politics. Like most of you, I never really imagined that government policy and advocacy would consume so much of my time as a banker. Almost every day, I just want to tune out what the politicians are saying or doing, or what they’re not doing. Yet if I ignore what’s happening in Jefferson City and Washington, D.C., I am hurting the customers and communities that my bank serves.
Tat’s why we encourage you and your staff to be an advocate — we must say what’s on our minds and share how the bills being considered will affect our communities and our ability to serve them.
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Right now, there’s a detrimental bill in the Missouri General Assembly that we must speak out against loudly as it threatens our ability to serve our communities. Senate Bill 388 would expand the field of membership for credit unions, basically giving them access to nearly the entire state. On Page 8, MBA Senior Vice President David Kent outlines the details of this bill and what its passage could mean for the banking community.
All you need to know about the bill is this — we must defeat it. Te way we accomplish this is through our Target Banker program.
Now more than ever, we need bankers from every single bank in our state to be at the Missouri Capitol this legislative session. Te key to soundly defeating this bill is to have a constant presence of bankers at the Capitol meeting directly with their state senators and
representatives to ardently express their opposition to this measure. If every bank commits to sending a few members of their staff on Target Banker visits, every single state senator and representative will know exactly where the banking community stands on this issue.
We can defeat this legislation with a strong, unified front, and it will take a commitment from every banker. How important is this bill’s defeat to you and your customers? Will you devote time and resources to defeat this bill? Will you let someone else handle it because you don’t have time to deal with this? You have a unique story to share about your community and how a new or expanding credit union will impact your community and your ability to serve their financial needs, and our legislators need to hear that story.
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