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The NCUA approved Tri Valley Service Federal Credit Union's change to a community charter last month. The shift will allow the credit union to expand its membership to serve anyone in a 16-municipality area around Pennsylvania.
According to the announcement from Tri Valley Service, headquartered in Pittsburgh ($16 million in assets and nearly 4,000 members), this move will significantly increase the credit union's ability to serve a growing number of people, "specifically the people who are unbanked or underbanked."
"The credit union mission, 'people helping people,' drives us to play a part in correcting the situation. Credit unions were established to promote savings, thrift and provide people of limited means access to credit," Carol Mattesi, CEO of Tri Valley Services, said.
She continued, "Tri Valley Service FCU has had great success with low cost personal loans and plans to offer those to the general public. This will help the underserved public refrain from turning to payday loans and check-cashing shops, especially during high spending times like the holidays."
According to the statement from Tri Valley Services, the community charter will also allow the credit union to:
- Offer low-cost and high-quality products to the community;
- Create future and sustainable growth for the credit union; and
- Expand current products to existing and new members.
"At Tri Valley Service FCU, we are also committed to putting members into the best loan option for them, not just the loan that will make us the most money. We look at each individual situation and underwrite accordingly," Mattesi said. "We don't just make all of our loans fall into a predefined bucket."
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Michael Ogden
Editor-in-Chief at CU Times. To connect, email at [email protected]. As Editor-in-Chief of CU Times since 2016, Michael Ogden has led the editorial team in all aspects of content strategy and execution, including the creation of the publication’s exclusive and proprietary research database of the credit union industry’s economic landscape. Under Michael’s leadership, CU Times has successfully shifted to an all-digital editorial product with new focuses on the payments, fraud, lending and regulatory beats. Most recently, he introduced a data-focused editorial product for subscribers that breaks down credit union issues into hard data, allowing for a deeper and more factual narrative for readers. In 2024, he launched the "Shared Accounts With CU Times" podcast, which offers a fresh, inside-the-newsroom perspective through interviews with leaders from the credit union industry and the regulatory world. He dives into pressing credit union issues, while revealing the personalities working behind-the-scenes to push the credit union world forward. His background includes years as a radio and TV anchor/reporter and a public relations and digital/social media manager, where he covered the food and music industries, as well as cooperatives and credit unions. Over the years, he has launched numerous exclusive video and podcast series, including a successful series of interactive backstage interviews with musicians at music festivals, showcasing his social media and live streaming production skills.
