The African-American Credit Union Coalition (AACUC) Future Fund Builds Pathways to Financial Inclusion

In celebration of Black History Month, we explore the AACUC Future Fund, a groundbreaking initiative transforming financial inclusion in the credit union movement. Since 1999, the African American Credit Union Coalition has been a pioneering force in fostering diversity and creating lasting positive impacts across communities. Through its four key pillars—internships and leadership development, small credit union sustainability, international cooperation with African financial cooperatives, and community wealth building—the Future Fund ensures sustainable funding for programs that expand access to financial services and create opportunities for future leaders.

This episode features:

• AACUC's historical role in advancing diversity in credit unions
• The strategic vision behind the Future Fund's launch
• How the four pillars drive meaningful change in communities
• Innovative approaches to developing diverse industry leaders
• Strategies for strengthening small credit unions
• International partnerships empowering African cooperatives
• Initiatives for building generational wealth
• Understanding charitable donation accounts as investment vehicles
• Ways credit unions can participate and drive change
• Insights from industry leaders on creating lasting impact

Join us for an inspiring discussion about building pathways to financial inclusion and honoring the legacy of cooperative finance in the Black community.

Chapters

• 0:11 AACUC Future Fund Impact Discussion
• 14:51 Impactful AACUC Future Fund Management
• 22:44 AACUC Future Fund Impact and Support
• 30:15 Investment Podcast Advisory and Disclaimer

Transcript

Mike Ensweiler: 0:11

Welcome everyone to, in your Best Interest, an ALM First podcast. A show that explores common depository challenges, giving you an insider's view of the latest market trends and sharing stories and insights from industry leaders. I'm your host, mike Ensweiler. The African American Credit Union Coalition, also known as the AACUC, has been a pioneering force in the credit union movement since 1999, working tirelessly to increase diversity in the industry, expand financial inclusion and create lasting positive impacts in the communities across the globe. Through initiatives like their Commitment to Change program and international partnerships, aacuc continues to shape the future of cooperative finance while building bridges between communities.

Mike Ensweiler: 1:01

Today, I'm joined by an exceptional panel of leaders who are driving transformative change through AACUC's Future Fund. These include Renee Saddi-White, the President and CEO of the AACUC. Bill Chaney, president and CEO of Schools First Federal Credit Union and the Honorary Chair of the AACUC Future Fund. Ty Muse, president and CEO of Visions Federal Credit Union, and also the Chair of the AACUC Future Fund. And Emily Hollis, ceo of ALM First. Today, we'll explore the vision behind the Future Fund, discuss its key pillars for creating lasting impact and learn how credit unions can get involved in this important initiative. Well, I'm honored to have Renee, emily, ty and Bill with me today. Hello everyone, and welcome to the show. Hello, hello everyone and welcome to the show. Hello.

Emily Hollis: 1:47

Hello, good to see everyone. Yeah, great to see everyone.

Mike Ensweiler: 1:51

All right. Well, let's dig right in and let's start with Renee. I'm going to start with you, renee, and ask you a question for the audience. Tell us a little bit about the role of the AACUC in the credit union movement.

Renée Sattiewhite: 2:04

Oh my gosh, Thank you for asking me and Mike, thank you for having us on here. I'm so excited, I'm so excited, I'm so excited Me too.

Renée Sattiewhite: 2:10

Oh my God, I am not a political person at all and I had the opportunity to go to the Congressional Black Caucus swearing in courtesy of America's credit unions. Jim and Carrie asked me to go and I loved it, and when I was there I got re-excited and re-just excited about the credit union industry. What I saw this group doing, being responsible for and listening to their message and their mission. I'm like they're just like ACC, so I feel like ACC is the heart and soul of our industry. I like to think that we kind of keep everybody on their toes but we're hopeful. So that's what I think our place is is to really show people that everybody belongs, and let's keep the mission of people helping people at the front of everything we do the mission of people, helping people, at the front of everything we do, and so which is really exciting.

Renée Sattiewhite: 3:13

And how do you see the AACUC changing over time? Well, over the years we've had so many things happen right, but I think most of it is because we try to have everybody involved with what we're doing. We want the whole industry to be part of reminding ourselves that we want everybody to have financial inclusion. We want everybody to have a good life. So ACC started off very, very small. I like to say that we were a CUNA baby, because we started at the governmental affairs conference, the GAC and a group of people meeting to make sure that the voices of African Americans and people of African descent are heard in the credit union industry. So I think what has changed is no longer are people scared or skeptical of ACC, because they now understand that we're probably one of the most inclusive organizations in the credit union ecosystem. At least, that's what Lucy Ito used to say, and I love quoting her about that, and so I think that's what's happened. We've moved to be the organization that's not just Black-centric but now just people-centric, because everybody matters.

Mike Ensweiler: 4:23

Yeah, especially these days, that's more important than ever and that's really exciting. You know, ty, I'm going to as the Future Fund chair. You know we've had a previous podcast where we talked about the Future Fund a little bit and charitable donation accounts and those kinds of things. So from you know your seat in the stadium. Why did the AACUC launch the Future Fund and why now?

Ty Muse: 4:45

Yeah, you know, for me it was pretty clear, it was a need. You know, when I first joined AACUC, on the board it was the previous leaders there. You know the Maurice's of the world whispering in my ear hey, ty, we need a plan that's going to be a little bit more sustainable. So one of the things you got to remember about AACUC we live directly on our membership, corporate partnerships and donations. Well, what happens when the world gets tight? Recession happens, those things all immediately decline. They're the first line items. We all start cutting, but the mission doesn't go away. The cause doesn't go away.

Ty Muse: 5:19

So it became a mandate that we needed to find a way to create a more sustainable future for this organization that was having a fantastic impact. And just think about the murder of George Floyd, who was the voice that was there, that was helping so many of our credit unions figure out the right tone, the right tenor, the right words to voice as a people, collectively, and just thinking about that resource. And that's not even dealing with all the other pillars. All those pillars are still there. All those needs are still there. All those needs are still there, but yet the dollars seem to go away. Because, you know, as Bill and I are running our credit unions. Trust me they were definitely. The last five years have been tough years and even though the needs there, sometimes you start cutting the other things. If we could find a way to effectively fund an organization that's doing good, they can rely not just on those donations but have other means.

Mike Ensweiler: 6:13

That was really the goal, a way to create sustainability.

Bill Cheney: 6:14

So Bill, how long have you been an AACUC supporter? Wow, mike, thank you first of all for having me and great to be with this great group of leaders A long time. I, long ago, was the CEO of Xerox Federal Credit Union and we worked with AECUC's intern program, which was an internship program, and what a fantastic way to build, first of all to bring new ideas into your organization, but also to help build future leaders of the credit union movement. So that was early on, to help build future leaders of the credit union movement. So that was early on. More recently, here at Schools First, we've been active supporters.

Bill Cheney: 6:51

Our team helped to be founding members and leaders of the West Coast chapter of ACUC. Kevin Martin, who's one of our EVPs, led that. Now Ashley Franklin, who's one of our key vice presidents in our branches, is part of that leadership, and so we're so pleased to be involved in AECUC and specifically with this future fund. My board of directors was supportive of us working early with Ty and Renee and others to help, and with ALM First to help set that up. And Ty said it. I mean you need a sustainable source of funding. You can't start at zero every year when you're trying to run an organization, you need something that you can count on for the future, and we're really excited about this and certainly encourage others to take a look at supporting this fine organization over the long term.

Mike Ensweiler: 7:48

You mentioned key pillars. Can you talk? Ty Renee, anyone can you talk a little bit more about what are the key pillars or the programmatic areas of the Future Fund?

Ty Muse: 7:59

Renee, I'll start on this, but I'll let you put your magic on it. I mean, because a lot of this is, you know, in her head and she built it and it's refined and now you know we have the words behind it. But you know, the four focuses that I can best speak to are, you know, internships and leadership development. As you think about all these different next talent, you know, if you want to ensure diverse groups of individuals are coming up through the CU world, you have to make sure we're developing them and creating these opportunities for them. Small credit union sustainability Look, in a day there's a story.

Ty Muse: 8:32

One of the things I've always been disappointed in as an outsider in is how I feel like credit union space has been divided Big credit unions, small credit union. Look, every large credit union wants a small credit union. So to me, I think there's an importance to not lose focus on supporting those initiatives and making sure they have the infrastructure and tools to help them be successful. And that's, you know I would say, the second pillar. The third pillar is, you know, empowering financial cooperatives in Africa. I haven't had as much direct experience with that, but obviously Renee and Bill can speak specifically to those visits and there's a lot to be learned about how banking is done there, as well as the cooperative nature, and it's really at the core and the spirit of what we do and I think there's a lot of opportunity there.

Ty Muse: 9:15

And then the final pillar is really wealth building and community impact. At the end of the day, we want to make our community stronger. We want to make our individuals within our community stronger, and without education and tools and resources, speaking in languages, speaking in a way that's familiar to each of the communities that we're in, they're not going to receive it. So that's really the four pillars as Renee's outlined them in my term on the board and my connection to AACC, but I don't know if Bill or Renee want to speak a little bit more about the travels to Africa and the lessons learned there from being abroad, et cetera.

Renée Sattiewhite: 9:52

Well, Mike, I don't have anything to add to what Ty said. He did a great job, but I'd really love to hear what Bill has to say about Kenya.

Bill Cheney: 10:00

Yeah, well, we were part of a. My wife Chrissy and I were part of a AECUC delegation that went to Kenya last year. I guess it is now Renee.

Renée Sattiewhite: 10:11

Oh, my God.

Bill Cheney: 10:12

And it's an amazing experience. It was not our first trip to Kenya or our first interaction with ACOSCA, which is the Continental Confederation of Credit credit unions in Africa. You know we have our America's credit unions here for our nation, but Akoska is the continent of Africa, so think about all the African nations and the impact that they have on people's lives. I've said for a long time, when you travel with the World Council or with AACUC overseas and visit credit unions, with the World Council or with AACUC overseas and visit credit unions, you learn so much and it's really like being in a time machine in some respects because sometimes you're traveling sort of back in times in terms of credit union development. Sometimes you're traveling into the future in terms of credit union development. Some of the experience, what credit unions must have been like in the US a long time ago, because they're young, they're small, some are struggling, some are thriving, but the impact not only is Africa the largest continent in the world, it's the youngest continent in the world and this is our future of our global economy and our global workforce and the credit unions are essential.

Bill Cheney: 11:35

One of the most impactful things Rene and I got to do while we were in Africa was meet with the president of Kenya, william Ruto.

Bill Cheney: 11:43

No relation, but he specifically has highlighted and emphasized the power of cooperatives in Kenya, so not just credit unions but the cooperative movement, and George Ambato, who is the executive director of Akoska, was there, and David Mategua, who is involved with the Africa Cooperative Development Foundation as well as with their corporate network for lack of a better term, emily on the continent of Africa. He's very involved with that, especially in Kenya, just to be there to talk about the importance of financial cooperatives, financial empowerment, financial inclusion, with the leader of the nation and the cabinet minister for cooperatives, rene, played an essential role in that talking about AACUC and about how AECUC is going to support African cooperative development Just amazing, and so I'm glad to hear and know that that's one of the key pillars for AECUC, because it certainly is something that I've been dedicated to for a long time and understanding that our responsibility to support cooperatives is not just in the United States of America. We should be supporting that globally and it helps us all.

Mike Ensweiler: 13:13

That's really cool and that's, I think, one of the exciting things about this fund. And so just to pivot to that cooperative idea for a minute and for those who may not be familiar, emily, can you tell us a little bit about what is a charitable donation account or a CDA, and what are the benefits of a CDA?

Emily Hollis: 13:38

of all I got to say too, I am so honored to be with this group and, mike, I'm really glad you started with Renee, because, man, renee, your excitement is so contagious. It's awesome, and I wish the listeners could see your smile from ear to ear.

Emily Hollis: 13:49

It's amazing, but anyway, I'm so honored to be with this group. So, yes, a charitable donation account is it's. It's an investment account that credit unions can participate in, where they support their donations to charities like the AACUC, which is 501C3. And the credit unions can use the CDAs for opportunities to fund charitable contributions through investment returns and, as Bill said before, it's so much easier this way for organizations to have an investment vehicle that provides returns to them, rather than trying to generate donations every year. So this is what is great about this fund in particular.

Mike Ensweiler: 14:49

So this is what is great about this fund in particular. But back to the CDA. When credit unions come together with vehicles like the CDA fund, it really can make a as we talked a little bit about some predictable funding every year versus all right. How are we going to be able to support these pillars and do this work? You know where you're in constant fundraising mode, so you know, renee, overall, you know what kind of impact are you trying to create with the fund. We've talked about the pillars, but talk a little bit about the impact.

Renée Sattiewhite: 15:20

Well, the Future Fund is a truly transformative funding source for ACC and with that, like you said not having to the guy's saying, not starting at ground zero every year, not depending on the personality types of CEOs and boards, just making sure that everything is going well I think that we'll be able to scale. We've got great programs and I've piloted so many different programs, but the ones that have stuck are good. But we need the resources to scale up to reach more people. And so, while I'm proud of all our programs, this gives us the opportunity to reach more people, to get deeper in the communities, to help credit unions with more programs that can help their communities and also leadership opportunities for credit unions who are outside of their credit unions. So, you know, sometimes in credit unions there's nowhere to go because the space is already filled. Well, at ACC, as a volunteer I have a part of the corporate partners sometimes will do a job share or maybe they will, like one of my chief diversity officer comes from CQ of North Carolina, emma Hayes. So she part of what their contribution is as a determined circle partner is her and her expertise as chief diversity officer and a pretty large, significant donation. So that type of thing. Scaling up from our programs is the impact I think we're going to have.

Renée Sattiewhite: 16:52

You'll also notice that at our events we have a lot of young people. So, just like Lucy Ito said about being diverse, we're probably the organization that, at least at our conferences, who gets the most young people to come. Now, part of that might be because I offer a little service called child care, so that might be it, but I'm just saying it gives the people an opportunity. The other thing that I'm really proud about is that at AACUC, we really lift up the young people. We want the young professionals to be seen and to be heard.

Renée Sattiewhite: 17:25

I remember being a young woman when I first started with AACUC a younger woman, 20 years younger anyway and from that standpoint and I called them the leaders, the legends, the ACC legends, the board of directors they were phenomenal people and they gave me a seat at their table and took me everywhere they went. So I was treated as if like nepotism, like I'm family, you know. So it's just a great thing. So I think the impact that I'm looking, I'm hoping that we have is that people's lives are changed for the better. I am a possibility of people serving other people passionately, and so everything I do is tied into that, and that passion along with people helping people keeps me up at night, making sure we're doing the right things. So my overall what I'd like to see is that we're helping to push our credit union system to do the right things for the right reasons.

Mike Ensweiler: 18:22

And I love that and let's build on that theme. So we want to do the right things for the right reasons. We've created a fund. You're getting some additional funding, so, ty or Bill, can you tell us a little bit about the management and the oversight of this fund?

Ty Muse: 18:37

Bill. I'll take the first part of that. So first, as we alluded to earlier, having great partners such as Emily and her firm and what they've been able to build, we have one of the larger donations that go through the CDA and effectively that's gonna be the major anchor, the beginning of the investments that we hold. Alm manages it, reports on it, reports to our committee and board that we have specifically focused on it as oversight to watch the returns and there's a lot of direction there, you know. But 30 years of history and what Emily's built. You know we feel pretty good about the first part. But then we also realized that everyone's in the same position you same position to make the larger donations. So we also have the other portion of our partnership that we've tied up with the National Co-op Bank to effectively allow us to purchase certificates and usually strong returns, and then we can allocate a portion of those dollars of the return back to AACUC, of the return back to AACUC, so part of it can be up to 100% of the earnings you can make, 50%, 75%, whatever that threshold may be. So it's a way to partake and participate without having to give up all those dollars but just having. Imagine if every credit union, if every credit union could just buy one certificate and allocate a portion of those funds to the AACC, that would be impactful. That would allow us to build a war chest, a reserve, to do all the great work that we're trying to do. So those two lines are really the best two ways to participate right away within the organization and I think that's what's really critical. And again, all those returns are reported and monitored. We have a team counting reports that basically takes the dollars, watches the dollars, reconciles the dollars and then we, through distributions, figure out which directives that we're then allocating to AACC to effectively run the organization and meet all those needs and pillars that we talked about earlier.

Ty Muse: 20:33

So for me it's a very win-win situation and no matter what your position is, you can easily say okay, I may not be able to give you the $100,000, but I can get a certificate for $100,000 and allocate the income to it and have an impact, and actually a very, very important impact. So, regardless of the size, you have a weight, you have a very measurable impact. So sometimes it's hard. When I hear a no, I'm like really, really, you're really going to say no to this. But you know, but I do understand, like we're all dealing with our own things. But when you really think it through that way, yeah, you have the ability to give. You have the ability to have an impact.

Ty Muse: 21:12

And let's not wait for another incident. Let's go ahead and be prepared. Let's go ahead and put ourselves in a position that we're already prepared and preparing our staff, our people. Let's not wait for just another major tragedy to kind of galvanize the country again. Let's not walk away from you know certain acronyms, because when you say those letters individually, they're equally as important today as they were yesterday. So I think this is how you can give, this is how you can give back and this is how, as an industry, we can win together and ensure that we have all the talent in the world, because we have the resources to train and develop them and also keep looking after our small credit unions.

Bill Cheney: 21:51

Yeah, very well said, ty. I mean we're at Schools First. We're very excited about the long-term impact. We're involved on the investment side. We have a history with ALM First and certainly comfortable. Emily and Mike, with your team, our CFO and our treasury team did their due diligence, obviously on what we're investing in here. But to share those long-term returns, we support AACUC in other ways too, but we know that this is going to be there for the long term and we can build it as we grow over time and as AACUC grows and addresses, you know, some really important issues that impact not just our credit union but credit unions all over the country and, as we talked about earlier, around the world Excited to be a part of it, Emily.

Mike Ensweiler: 22:44

both Ty and Bill mentioned ALM First's involvement. Can you share a little bit about how ALM First is supporting the Future Fund?

Emily Hollis: 22:53

Yes, absolutely, and Bill Ty Renee, thank you so much for the compliments Again. This is so exciting for us too. I think that this is making such a difference in the credit union industry a diversified portfolio of fixed income securities. We are staying in investment grade credit, so we're not dropping down in credit but stay in investment grade, and sectors would include mortgage backed securities, corporate debt and asset backed securities. Now, to mitigate interest rate risk and to also attract some additional spread, we are employing interest rate derivatives to help target the effective duration of the fund, and so these are all how we're managing the portfolio, and we've got an excellent team to do this role.

Mike Ensweiler: 23:57

So we're managing the dollars. Essentially we're helping to give a portion, a pretty big portion, of that return back to the AACUC and then the investors get some portion of that return back to themselves, so they do have an earning asset on the books. And then Ty and Bill and others are providing kind of the management and the oversight of those funds to make sure they're spent on the pillars and what their intended, you know purpose is. Did I summarize that correctly?

Renée Sattiewhite: 24:27

Absolutely.

Mike Ensweiler: 24:28

Yes, all right, good, good, good. Well, our time is coming to a close. So you know, I know both Ty and Bill mentioned, you know the impact and it's really exciting. And I agree, renee's enthusiasm is contagious. So I'm going to throw this out to the group, kind of for your closing thoughts as well as how can interested credit unions get involved now? How can they help support the great work that's going on here? And maybe we just do a little bit of an around the horn and we'll start with you, renee here and maybe we just do a little bit of around the horn, and we'll start with you, renee.

Renée Sattiewhite: 25:07

Well, the first thing is you can go to the AACUC impact website at aacucorg backslash future fund. But I have to say this, mike, so thank you one for giving us this platform. But I want to say publicly to Emily, bill and Ty I can't thank you enough. And Jason, I can't thank you enough. Emily, when we came to you, you were like yes, let's do it. When I came to Ty, I said Ty, I've selected you because you've got a great background in finance and if you're the chair, no one's going to question me. And then my hero, bill Cheney oh my God, I'm just thrilled. So thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, oh gosh.

Bill Cheney: 25:42

Thank you, renee. Please go to the website, check it out. We all make investments. This is another investment, large or small, as Ty said. It can be a CD through the National Cooperative Bank. It can be an investment vehicle through ALM. First, share those returns with AACUC, you will see the impact. It's a very transparent and inclusive organization. No secrets document on their website and in their amazing meetings and seminars and webinars that they have the change that is happening and the impact that they're making. So please take a look and join us at Schools First in supporting AACUC.

Ty Muse: 26:36

Yeah, my closing thoughts is you know, as a former CFO of the group, you know, before becoming a CEO, sometimes you look at things straight as a dollars and cents thing, from the CEO standpoint. This is an investment, right. This is an investment in things that make us special. This is an investment in the credit union that makes us different, things that make us special. This is an investment in the credit union movement that makes us different. This is one more thing that separates us from, specifically, the banking institutions how we give and how we support the collective at all times.

Ty Muse: 27:06

And so when you're thinking about this, you know I know you're all looking at your bottom lines, thinking about how can you afford it? But I'm going to say it the other way around how do you not afford it? How do we not afford to invest in the future of our industry? How do we not afford to invest in the bench that we have coming up and then leverage the tools After you make that investment. Start leveraging the tools AACUC has. You know, for me, I try my best to hop on as many webinars that we provide and education as one of the leaders of the board, but also as a participant. You know I have gone to certain conferences, but you know the topics. There are a wide variety of things, and they're all things that we actually are thinking about, but maybe we just don't have the resource, talent or bandwidth to address, and at least this will give you a head start. So I think there's a way to get an investment and a different way to measure your return, and that's what I'm just asking you to consider.

Mike Ensweiler: 27:59

That's great, Emily. Closing thoughts.

Emily Hollis: 28:02

Okay, closing thoughts. Yes, renee, thanks for the compliment and I was really so excited, but I have to tell you then I passed it to my team and they did all the work. So I really have to thank Jason Haley for getting this up and running, because he's our chief investment officer and let me tell you, I think the challenge was really working with the attorneys to get the fund up and running. So that was the real challenge. But in any event, closing thoughts, participate in the fund. I mean, aacu is doing fabulous things and as little or as much as you want having a fund like this I mean it doesn't have to be a huge amount Just participating and testing it out and see how it works is, I think, really, really thrilling for the industry.

Mike Ensweiler: 28:50

Well, this has been great. Thank you so much, everyone for sharing your time today and I really hope that your efforts continue to make a difference and look forward to seeing those impact reports. And again, for any information on how you can become involved in the AACUC or in the future fund, go to the AACUC website. And, of course, you can always reach out to Renee or Jason Haley at any time and they can answer any or most of your questions. So thanks everyone for joining us today, thank you, thank you for joining us for this powerful discussion about the African American Credit Union Coalition Future Fund. Some of the key takeaways for me from this conversation are one that the Future Fund represents a transformative opportunity to ensure AACUC's long-term sustainability through smart investment strategies, and that all credit unions can support this vital mission through vehicles like the charitable donation accounts and certificates of deposit.

Mike Ensweiler: 29:51

I appreciate you listening. At the end of each episode. I'd like to take a moment and let you know more about the resources we have available. Alm First has a robust workshop, conference and webinar schedule, so be sure to visit our website for more details on these, as well as our Education Hub and Resource Center for pre-recorded webinars, articles and more as always, stay safe, stay healthy and thank you for listening to, in your Best Interest. An Aon First podcast. The content in this podcast is provided for informational purposes and should not be relied upon as recommendations or financial planning advice.

Disclaimer: 30:31

We encourage you to seek personalized advice from qualified professionals regarding all investment decisions. Current and future holdings are subject to risk and past performance has no guarantee of future results. Podcasts should not be copied, distributed, published or reproduced in a whole or in part. Information presented herein is for discussion and illustrative purposes only and is not a recommendation or an offer or solicitation to buy or sell any securities. The views and opinions expressed by the ALM First Financial Advisor speakers are their own as of the date of the recording. Any such views are subject to change at any time, based upon market or other conditions, and ALM First Financial Advisors disclaims any responsibility to update such views. These views should not be relied on as investment advice and, because investment decisions are based on numerous factors, may not be relied on as an indication of trading intent on behalf of any.

Bill Cheney: 31:07

ALM.

Disclaimer: 31:07

First Financial Advisors product. Neither ALM First Financial Advisors nor the speaker can be held responsible for any direct or incidental loss incurred by applying any of the information offered. Alm First Financial Advisors is an SEC-registered investment advisor with a fiduciary duty that requires it to act in the best interest of clients and to place the interest of clients before its own. However, registration as an investment advisor does not imply any level of skill or training.