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Ahead of today's Senate Banking Committee hearing to discuss efforts to support small businesses amid the ongoing coronavirus pandemic, NAFCU Vice President of Legislative Affairs Brad Thaler highlighted the ways in which credit unions have stepped up to support Main Street small businesses and shared areas where additional help is needed to support their communities.

Relatedly, the Senate Small Business Committee Wednesday advanced the nomination of Isabel Guzman to serve as administrator of the Small Business Administration (SBA). During her testimony earlier this month, Guzman noted her commitment to improving the administering of pandemic relief through the SBA’s programs and making needed improvements to SBA programs that provide non-pandemic related relief. Her nomination now heads to the full Senate for consideration.

In the letter, Thaler outlined several measures to be included in the next coronavirus relief package to help credit unions support Main Street small businesses, including:

• relief under the member business lending (MBL) cap;
• changes to SBA loan programs to improve access;
• extending credit unions' loan maturity limits under the Federal Credit Union (FCU) Act; and
• flexibility under the FCU Act to allow credit unions to add underserved areas to their field of membership.

Thaler also reiterated other areas NAFCU would like addressed in future relief efforts, including capital flexibility under the FCU Act similar to what banks were provided in the CARES Act, additional investment authorities for federal credit unions, modernizing the E-SIGN Act, and providing credit unions with liability protections.

In addition, Thaler called for some previous relief provisions to be extended or made permanent, including expanded access to the NCUA's Central Liquidity Facility (CLF), relief from the current expected credit loss (CECL) standard, and the NCUA’s ability to establish a maximum guarantee to all shares or deposits held in a federally-insured credit union and cautioned against some efforts that could hinder credit unions' abilities to serve their members.

Read Thaler's full letter here. The hearing will be available via livestream and is scheduled to begin at 9:30 a.m. Eastern.

NAFCU will continue to work closely with the Biden administration, Congress, and regulators to seek tools that allow credit unions and their members to recover from the pandemic and thrive.