LOS ANGELES – To help with the aftermath of the Ecuador earthquake that devastated 26 credit unions and more than 250,000 members, Los Angeles Federal Credit Union (LAFCU) donated $10,000 to the World Council of Credit Unions. One hundred percent of LAFCU donations received by World Council will go directly to credit union disaster relief in the affected region.
In 2015, LAFCU also donated $10,000 to World Council to assist credit unions affected by the Nepal earthquake. In the past ten years, LAFCU and its charity organization, Los Angeles Charitable Association, Inc. have donated nearly $60,000 toward helping U.S. and international credit unions rebuild their infrastructure after a major natural disaster.
The World Council more recently raised over $500,000 to rebuild credit unions in the Philippines and Nepal following incidents in 2013 and 2015, respectively. With support from the global credit union movement, World Council has leveraged its resources to rebuild hundreds of financial institutions, improve infrastructure and bring rehabilitation services to millions of members in these countries.
CUNA Mutual Group, U.S. credit unions and movement supporters have already made efforts to help Ecuador credit unions with power outages, broken communication lines and damage to physical infrastructure preventing credit union members from accessing their financial resources. Much needed cash contributions from the overall global credit union industry will offer additional assistance where needed.