Dollar takes his message to radio; says agency should exceed his 4% staff reduction goal

WASHINGTON-NCUA Chairman Dennis Dollar is riding high on the waves.radio waves that is. He served as a guest on the weekly radio program “The Business of Government Hour” on WJFK 106.7 FM Saturday, November 2 at 8:00a.m. Dollar discussed the progress of NCUA’s Accountability In Management (AIM) program, successes of the Access Across America initiative, and Regulatory Flexibility. “One of our goals was to try to bring about efficiency in the agency,” Dollar said of AIM. “As I mentioned.we had 20,000 credit unions that we were regulating or insuring in 1985 and today it’s down below 10,000. Naturally, you cannot continue to grow an agency or keep an agency staffed to oversee 20,000 institutions where you are only overseeing 10,000.” He added that he felt NCUA owed it to the stakeholders to accomplish the streamlining without any layoffs and as little disruption as possible. The chairman believes the agency will exceed his 4% staff reduction goal next year. Another part of NCUA’s money saving changes is the risk-based examination process, which Dollar pointed out has saved the agency “tens of thousands of examiner hours,” freeing up time to aid struggling credit unions. He said the agency is “walking that very difficult and fine line between efficiency but still providing the level of service that our stakeholders deserve.” Dollar directed listeners to NCUA’s and Access Across America’s Web site for more information on credit unions and the 33 million potential members in underserved areas added to credit unions’ fields of membership through the program. The hour-long show focuses on the careers, agency accomplishments, and vision of government leaders and is hosted by Paul Lawrence and Debra Cammer, both partners at show sponsor PricewaterhouseCoopers-IBM Global Services. [email protected]