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NAFCU's Carrie Hunt noted the regulatory restrictions that prevent credit unions from doing more to serve their members in rural communities in a letter sent Tuesday, ahead of a Senate Banking subcommittee hearing today addressing the challenges of rural banking.

Today's hearing will include testimony from Timberland Federal Credit Union President and CEO Carrie Wood. Wood, whose credit union is in DuBois, Pa., will testify alongside representatives from First National Bank of Phillip, S.D., and MCS Bank of Lewistown, Pa. The hearing is slated to begin at 10 a.m. Eastern.

In her letter, Hunt, NAFCU's senior vice president of government affairs and general counsel, noted the limitations within NCUA regulations and wrote that more could be done to expand the agency's definition of rural districts.

"NAFCU believes a more flexible definition of a rural district would increase availability of financial services to rural communities that might otherwise not have access to financial services," she wrote to Senate Banking Subcommittee on Financial Institutions and Consumer Protection Chairman Patrick Toomey, R-Pa., and Ranking Member Jeff Merkley, D-Ore.

She also noted that the regulatory burden, specifically the new mortgage lending regulations issued by CFPB, "creates significant obstacles to providing rural communities with the mortgage lending they need." Hunt also mentioned that the current method used by CFPB to recognize rural areas does not always accurately capture all qualifying communities across the nation.