{"id":10147,"date":"2019-05-02T20:04:19","date_gmt":"2019-05-02T20:04:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/?p=10147"},"modified":"2019-05-02T20:04:19","modified_gmt":"2019-05-02T20:04:19","slug":"valley-federal-credit-union-turns-84","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/?p=10147","title":{"rendered":"Valley Federal Credit Union Turns 84"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"attachment_10141\" style=\"width: 610px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-10141\" class=\"size-full wp-image-10141\" src=\"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/051.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"600\" height=\"295\" srcset=\"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/051.jpg 600w, https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/051-300x148.jpg 300w, https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/051-405x199.jpg 405w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 600px) 100vw, 600px\" \/><p id=\"caption-attachment-10141\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">VFCU Board of Directors at the 84th annual meeting. Photo: Tony Vindell\/LFN<\/p><\/div>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\"><em><strong>by Tony Vindell\/LFN<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n<p>It was 84 years ago this month when Valley Federal Credit Union opened its doors on Levee Street in Brownsville with three employees.<\/p>\n<p>Today, the financial institution employs about 40 people at its main office on Price Road in Brownsville and at its Harlingen and Raymondville branches.<\/p>\n<p>According to its annual report, VFCU currently has more than $72 million in assets and has made more than $42 million in loans.<\/p>\n<p>The credit union has about 10,000 members and provides most services a bank offers except home loans.<\/p>\n<p>Olga I. Villarrreal, VFCU president and CEO, said it has taken them a long time to get where they are today.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe are probably the oldest credit union in the Rio Grande Valley,\u201d she said during the credit union annual meeting held Saturday, April 13 at the Amigoland Events Center. \u201cOne of the unique things about us is that our members know their loan officers.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Clifford Rowell, chairman with the credit union supervisory committee, said he first got in contact with the business back in 1986 while seeking what he called a signature loan for $32,000.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cHere you are like a family member,\u201d he said, \u201cnot just a number.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Ray Ortiz, a Los Fresnos resident who serves on Rowell\u2019s committee, said VFCU first opened to provide services to federal employees but evolved into what it is today \u2013 a financial institution with a family atmosphere.<\/p>\n<p>He is also a member of Los Fresnos zoning and planning committee and past president of Los Fresnos Chamber of Commerce.<\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_10140\" style=\"width: 610px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-10140\" class=\"size-full wp-image-10140\" src=\"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/048.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"600\" height=\"380\" srcset=\"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/048.jpg 600w, https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/048-300x190.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 600px) 100vw, 600px\" \/><p id=\"caption-attachment-10140\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Ray Ortiz, left, of Los Fresnos and Clifford Rowell of Rancho Viejo are VFCU supervisory committee members. Photo: Tony Vindell\/LFN<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>by Tony Vindell\/LFN It was 84 years ago this month when Valley Federal Credit Union opened its doors on Levee Street in Brownsville with three employees. Today, the financial institution employs about 40 people at its main office on Price Road in Brownsville and at its Harlingen and Raymondville branches. According to its annual report, [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":10141,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-10147","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-local"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10147","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=10147"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10147\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10148,"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10147\/revisions\/10148"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/10141"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=10147"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=10147"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=10147"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}