NCUA today announced that the agency will undergo a restructuring in an effort to improve efficiencies, responsiveness and cost-effectiveness. The restructuring will lead to the consolidation of regional offices and a staff reorganization. Most notably, NCUA’s Albany office will be closed and merged into another regional office.

“While I feel it’s a loss for New York, I understand the changes and potential efficiencies that technology brings to all organizations, including NCUA,” said New York Credit Union Association President/CEO William J. Mellin.

The agency anticipates that the restructuring will lead to a staff reduction. Additional details will be announced at NCUA’s fall budget briefing.

Here is the press release announcing the restructuring plans:

NCUA Plans Restructuring to Improve Efficiency, Meet Future Challenges

​​​Regional Offices Will Consolidate; Staffing Will be Reorganized

ALEXANDRIA, Va. (July 21, 2017) — Greater efficiency, responsiveness, and cost-effectiveness are goals of a long-range agency restructuring plan the National Credit Union Administration Board announced today.

“The time has come for the NCUA business model to change,” Board Chairman J. Mark McWatters said. “Positioning the NCUA to meet the changing demands of the credit union system we regulate in a transparent and fully accountable manner while promoting efficiency and effectiveness is essential. Re-evaluating our operations is integral to fulfilling our statutory responsibilities to protect the deposits of the nearly 108 million credit union members while maintaining the safety and soundness of the Share Insurance Fund and the viability of the credit union system.”

“Months of very hard work by agency staff have produced a solid, commonsense plan that will help the agency respond to a new economic environment without sacrificing its ability to ensure the safety and soundness of our credit union system,” Board Member Rick Metsger said. “The restructuring effort will come together over a period of years, and credit unions will reap tangible benefits from our work.”

The agency created internal review teams in late 2016 to rethink the agency’s operations, discuss how it can re-tool to do its job better, and make recommendations to the Board. Among the recommendations the Board approved are:

• Consolidate the agency’s five regional offices into three by closing the Albany, New York, and Atlanta, Georgia offices and eliminate four of the agency’s five leased facilities;
• Create an Office of Credit Union Resources and Expansion by redefining and realigning chartering and field-of-membership, credit union development, grants and loans, and minority depository institutions programs;
• Restructure the Office of Examination and Insurance into specialized working groups; and
• Realign the Asset Management and Assistance Center to include changes to the servicing business model and moving to a financial supervisory structure.

NCUA also plans to eliminate agency offices with overlapping functions and improve functions such as examination reporting, records management, and procurement. The proposed plan anticipates a reduction in the agency’s workforce by attrition.

Additional details of the agency’s plan, including projected cost savings, will be available at the upcoming fall budget briefing. The most recent agency restructuring occurred in 2003.