Submitted
Longtime Nelson and District Credit Union director at large Lorne Westnedge has been re-elected board chair. Fellow director at large Laureen Barker was re-elected first vice-chair while Nelson representative area director Michael Bancroft was elected second vice-chair.
The elections followed the credit union’s 68th annual general meeting at the end of last month, which included a discussion of the proposed merger of six credit unions in the Kootenay Boundary.
In a news release, the credit union said the past year’s high points included positive growth in assets, members’ deposits and members’ loans, while also distributing close to $93,000 to community organizations within the West Kootenay region, and completing Trusted Advisor training with its employees.
“We continued to make changes internally by reorganizing management responsibilities to better position ourselves for the changing financial services landscape,” CEO Tom Murray said.
“Also, every NDCU employee completed professional-development training in 2018, with the objective of providing the best possible service and advice to our members. We introduced new tools for members, such as e-Transfer enhancements and Docusign, which enables you to execute documents without coming into a branch, and we installed new ATMs in all our communities.”
Assets increased by 6.3 per cent to over $230 million, members’ deposits increased by 6.5 per cent to $211.5 million, members’ loans increased by 13 per cent to $190.9 million, community investment since 2000 reached $3.53 million, and strong growth was reported from subsidiaries KIS Ltd and NDCU MoneyWorks.
At the AGM, newly acclaimed director Greg Stacey was introduced. He will serve as a director for the Nelson area for two years. Acclaimed directors Bancroft, Barker and Colin McClure were also introduced. Bancroft and McClure will serve as directors for the Nelson area while Barker will serve as director at large, all for three-year terms.
Results from a recent special resolution vote were also announced. The purpose of the resolution was to allow members to vote for directors and other special resolutions electronically, in addition to in person at branch offices or by mail ballot. To enable the board to make this change, amendments to the credit union’s rules must be approved by the credit union’s members. Voting in all branches took place between April 16 and 18. The final vote was in favour of making the required rule changes.