NCUA Board Approves Performance Plan, Welcomes New Member

During Thursday’s NCUA Board meeting, members approved the agency’s 2024 Annual Performance Plan in a 3-0 vote. The plan provides specific direction and guidance toward meeting goals and objectives laid out in the NCUA’s 2022-2026 Strategic Plan.

“As I have often said, if you don’t measure it, you can’t manage it. That’s what makes this plan so important,” NCUA Chairman Todd Harper said. “The NCUA in 2024 will continue to address consumer financial protection on equal footing with safety and soundness, including by increasing the number of fair lending exams. Also, the NCUA will continue to focus on the rising and continuing challenges within the credit union system. Those risks include liquidity, interest rate, credit and compliance risk, as well as the omnipresent cybersecurity risk.”

Thursday’s NCUA Board meeting was not only the first meeting of 2024, it was the first meeting attended by Board Member Tanya Otsuka, who was sworn in last week by Chairman Harper.

During remarks at the beginning of the meeting, Harper welcomed Otsuka to the Board table. “Board Member Otsuka brings a wealth of policy-making and regulatory experience to the position. She served as a senior policy advisor in the Senate and as an attorney at the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation. And she is very well versed on many of the policy issues that we will consider here on the NCUA Board.”

Harper continued, “Additionally, Board Member Otsuka is a ground breaker. She is the first Asian-American to serve on the NCUA Board in the agency’s 54-year history. Together, that personal background and her professional experiences will inform her work at the NCUA over the next six years. So let me welcome you Board Member Otsuka to the Board table.”

Otsuka took a few moments to address her new colleagues on the Board.

“Thank you, Chair Harper. I appreciate it,” Otsuka said. “And thank you for swearing me in last week! I am excited to be here today at my first Board meeting. It was an honor to be nominated by President Biden and confirmed by the U.S. Senate to serve as NCUA Board Member and it’s particularly meaningful as someone who has spent their career in public service. Chair Harper, Vice Chairman Hauptman and my predecessor the honorable Rodney Hood have been gracious and welcoming as I join the Board. Chair Harper and Vice Chair Hauptman, thank you. I’m looking forward to what we can achieve together.”

During his comments, Vice Chairman Kyle Hauptman welcomed in Otsuka and said, “Tanya probably shows up with more knowledge than most at these sorts of agencies having worked not only at the committee that has oversight, but at the FDIC. So, Tanya has now worked for 100% of entities that insure American deposits.”