WASHINGTON – Credit unions ought to start now to review their branch leases in Wal-Mart Stores given the controversy surrounding the retailer's application for a Utah industrial loan bank, advises Washington attorney V. Gerard Comizio. Comizio, a partner in Thacher Proffitt & Wood and the former deputy senior counsel for the U.S. Treasury's Office of Thrift Supervision, urged CUs "to contact Wal-Mart to renegotiate the leases if they find termination is not by mutual consent." Such a move, he said, would help ensure "the credit union is in the driver's seat." Just how many of the estimated 50 CUs with Wal-Mart branches would be ready and willing to seek a rewrite of contracts, many of which are for five-year terms with five-year renewal options, was unclear. But Comizio said lease terms have suddenly become a pressing matter following a demand to Wal-Mart by U.S. Rep. Barney Frank (D-Mass.), a member of the House Financial Services Committee, asking the retailer provide copies of branch agreements relating to the duration of bank and CU leases. In a letter to the retailer, Frank charged executives gave conflicting testimony during unprecedented public hearings last month before the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. on Wal-Mart's request for deposit insurance to open the Utah ILC.

Comizio, a former general counsel for the Securities and Exchange Commission, said testimony at the hearings demonstrated bank and CU leases at the stores are by no means identical.

Many CUs have said they expect to stay on site for years to come and are trusting Wal-Mart that the retailer would not close them down or open their own diversified banking operation in the stores.