SECU What Next? A State Of "Ultimate Inversion"?

  ... to paraphrase a commenter.

✅ Anonymous June 5, 2025 at 10:37 AM

“We are fast approaching the stage of the ultimate inversion: the stage where the SECU Board is free to do anything it pleases, while the members may act only by permission.” — Ayn Rand

Need to finish up with the look at the letter [link] from Ms. Cathleen Plaut, SECU Chief Legal Officer (CLO), describing her growing list of prohibitions eliminating SECU members' democratic rights in their credit union. The scales of justice have intentionally been tipped out of balance - not a promising sign.

No need to repeat the new prohibitions against SECU members speaking at the annual meeting or addressing the credit union Board with suggestions or resolutions. Ms. Plaut confesses to these prohibitions. Ms. Plaut does conveniently under-cite an NCUA legal opinion permitting the elimination of member resolutions from the floor. The SECU member letter to which Ms. Plaut was responding requested procedures for submitting member resolutions in advance of the meeting. Advance resolutions are authorized under both federal and state credit union bylaws under "New Business"  - and are legally mandated under all business/corporation law. In the business world, barring individual shareholder resolutions is not optional. 

In her letter, the CLO seems to realize that the member resolution prohibition doesn't stand up to impartial scrutiny, nor what's legally required. So in passing, the letter states that SECU members do have the right to make such resolutions if they call a "Special Meeting". Unfortunately on that legal "Hail Mary" - as you might suspect - no procedures nor format for such a "Special Meeting" exist at SECU! Remarkable for the CLO to suggest a "Special Meeting" for which no Board approved rules exist.

The CLO also states: "Allowing member resolutions related to the operations of a credit union would usurp the role of the Board of Directors...". No SECU member has ever submitted a resolution attempting "to usurp the Board" related to the operations of the credit union. Not aware of any member who is interested in doing so! A more diplomatic, member-first CLO might have simply thought to ask what folks had in mind... wouldn't you? Again that question: "Why does the SECU Board fear the members?"

Lastly, if you're one of those "conspiracy theory"-types... and who isn't these days! Take note of one other "midnight approved" SECU bylaw change, which would allow the SECU annual meeting to be held "virtually". Can well-understand that the Board might at this point wish that the annual meeting "would go away", but neither NC statutes, nor federal credit union laws permit a virtual-only annual meeting! In fact, Mr. Schline, CEO of the CU trade association, has been trying to change NC law for four years (H410/H187!) without success to make a virtual only meeting legal!!! 

😎 How can SECU have adopted a state regulator-approved bylaw amendment, which does not conform to existing NC law? A "seat of the pants, make up "stuff" as you go" legal environment? It all sounds a bit silly... but much is at stake for 2.5+ million North Carolinians. 

✅ Will write our Credit Union regulator tomorrow for clarification; it's her call. North Carolinians surely don't want to endure an Ayn Rand state of "ultimate inversion"...

 

  "You'll know what you need to know when you know it."

SECU What's Next? The "New/New" Authoritarian Democracy?

   Just SECU Or Everywhere?

We've been banging away on the suppression of democratic cooperative principles at SECU. The purging of SECU member rights has been purposeful and extensive. And the question remains: "Why does the SECU Board fear the members?" 

The SECU Board and elite leadership team (ELT) seem befuddled by the idea that  SECU members have a right to be heard and make motions, resolutions at the annual business meeting. These fundamental rights are prescribed in the standard bylaws published by both the North Carolina Credit Union regulator and by the federal credit union regulator NCUA. That standard was firmly embedded in writing in the SECU bylaws for 86 years, until the "we/we" SECU Board's "no vote/no voice" 2023 bylaw amendments.

  If SECU so desperately seeks the mediocrity of "industry standard", then the SECU Board has failed that test largely. SECU has become  "the new unicorn" among all credit unions in the destructive, dismantling of  democratic, cooperative credit union principles. The SECU Board and ELT are now recognized within the credit union movement as "first without equals" - leadership without peer!

Every business person in the U.S. understands that a board of directors may not prohibit a shareholder from being heard at an annual meeting.  True business leaders like Warren Buffet prove that year after year. If you own only a single share of Bank of America, Duke Power, Walmart, McDonald's in your 401-k, you have the legal, democratic right to speak and participate as a shareholder.

😎 If LGFCU/CIVIC credit union encourages open member participation at its annual meeting...why doesn't SECU? 

✅ North Carolina state government should not be proud of this lapse in fair, citizen-first regulation. "Fiduciary duty" should have meaning and require accountability - for both the regulated and regulator. 

The failure to act besmudges us all.

"First In Freedom"... last in practice?