The head of a Seattle credit union bypassed in the merger process to take over a failed but small competitor expressed disappointment today at the outcome but said he still supports the final result of protecting members.

Commenting on the state and NCUA-engineered takeover of the $27 million Transportation Northwest CU by the $4 billion Alaska USA FCU, Tom Graves, president/CEO of Prevail CU, said some steps in the NCUA process of awarding the final bid to the Anchorage CU appeared puzzling "and beyond my scope of experience with this sort of thing."

Nonetheless, Prevail's board had "done its due diligence in making plans over the summer to merge" the long ailing Seattle CU, which had capital below 1% and suffered huge real estate losses over the last two years. Transportation had been managed by Prevail in line with an April consent order issued by the Washington Division of Financial Institutions to find a partner.