Must Reads
Trusted News for Credit Union Leaders
Credit Union Times
JUNE 13, 2018 | VOL. 29 | NO. 20 | CUTIMES.COM
FOCUSREPORT:
MEMBERSHIP
GROWTH
It’s on the mind of every credit
union CEO: How can I persuade
more consumers to join the credit
union movement? In this Focus
Report, pros share eight secrets
to growing membership. Y6
The FOM
Opportunity
Don’t miss a chance
to expand your
member pool. Y13
Numbers
Bring Good
News
Member growth,
engagement
rises. Y11
HUMAN RESOURCES
Medical Marijuana at Work
To date, 29 states and the Dis-
trict of Columbia have legalized
marijuana for medicinal pur-
poses. Some states (i.e., Califor-
nia) have been grappling with
the implications of medicinal
marijuana use for several years,
while others (i.e., Pennsylvania)
are just beginning to explore the
complicated world of medicinal
cannabis and its many tentacles.
As a labor and employment law
attorney, when it comes to medi-
cal marijuana, the question I
am most asked is, “What does
medical marijuana mean for our
workplace and/or our drug-test-
ing policies?”
Given the dearth of state regu-
lations and case law on the topic,
answering this question is not
easy. Generally, the answer to
this question turns on two things:
The medical marijuana legisla-
tion in the state(s) in which the
company does business and
the company’s overall tempera-
ment for medical marijuana us-
age. However, further clouding
the answer is federal law. While
a majority of states have jumped
on the medical marijuana band-
wagon, and nine have legalized
recreational marijuana use, the
federal government continues
to classify marijuana as a highly
controlled, Schedule I drug.
The Controlled Substances
Act, federal legislation passed in
1970 as part of the Comprehensive Drug Abuse and Prevention
Act, specifies how certain substances — such as mari- Y15
CULedger Elevates Relationships
ULedger, LLC, is
gaining distributed
ledger legs with its
MyCUID initiative, a
consumer-focused, global digital-identity solution, which it expects
will enhance the already-trusted
relationship between members
and their credit unions.
“MyCUID is intended to really
transform the credit union indus-
try in providing the
first universal digi-
tal credential,” Ju-
lie Esser, chief en-
gagement officer
for CULedger, said.
“This is not just a
U.S. initiative. This
is a global initiative.”
CULedger, a consortium of U.S.
credit unions exploring potential
use cases for distributed ledger
technology, began in 2016 as a
“research to action” initiative. Its
mission aimed to deliver inno-
vative applications in a permis-
sioned, distributed, shared ledger
platform for credit unions.
Shared-ledger technology cre-
ates an online system through
which multiple certified parties
can securely exchange informa-
tion and conduct transactions,
with those exchanges certified
by all the organizations, called
nodes, and participate in a pri-
vate permissioned network using
industry-leading DLT.
FINTECH
ROY URRICO
rurrico@cutimes.com
Y16
Esser
MCU: What
Went Wrong?
INTERNAL FRAUD
PETER STROZNIAK
pstrozniak@cutimes.com
n its 2016 annual report, the
$2.8 billion Municipal Credit
Union touted how its Internal Audit Department conducted more than 50 integrated
audits in the credit union’s divisions of operations, compliance,
IT and finance, and continuously
audited the most sensitive areas of
New York’s largest credit union by
members.
Presumably, those audits included a review and testing of internal controls to detect and prevent internal fraud. But industry
experts said those internal controls obviously broke down because of a serious lack of oversight
by key personnel, the supervisory
committee and the board of directors, which led to a multimillion-dollar fraud scandal by its CEO.
While the consequences of this
fraud case will have a lasting impact on MCU, industry experts
offered insights about how executives may prevent similar circumstances from happening at their
credit union.
Federal prosecutors alleged that
Kam Wong, MCU’s president/CEO
for 11 years, stole millions of dollars from the credit union through
various fraudulent schemes between 2013 and 2018, and spent
$3.5 million of the money on New
York lottery tickets. A criminal
complaint, based on the findings
of a federal investigation, Y17
