PERRYSBURG – St. Rose Parish Credit Union is now a part of Great Lakes Credit Union.
The two financial entities merged Jan. 1.
Frank Brahier, Perrysburg, who has served as manager and treasurer of St. Rose Credit Union for 22 years,
noted that the merger "was very voluntary. We’ve been looking for a credit union to merge with for
about the last year."
"It was established in 1958. It was established as a St. Rose parish church group credit
union," he said later.
The reason for the merger came largely due to a change in its membership.
Brahier said there were "a lot of younger people who wanted more services. They wanted checking
accounts, IRAs, text banking," home loans, and other services.
"We were state-chartered, federally-insured, but we were not set up to do those kinds of
transactions. So we were very healthy. We’re one of the healthiest credit unions in the whole state of
Ohio," but the dearth of services caused membership to decline. He said when the merger began, the
credit union had about 250 members.
All of the members of the credit union were "either parishioners or they’re part of what we call the
church group, relatives or parishioners. So basically it’s made up of parishioners and their
relatives."
"It was completely volunteer," Brahier said of the credit union’s operations, noting that he,
the credit union’s board, and its committee were all volunteers. There were no paid employees.
"The only thing that we paid was rent of an office."
He said that one of the reasons that Great Lakes Credit Union, headquartered in Sylvania, was picked as
their merging partner was that, in addition to being federally insured and state-chartered, that credit
union had an office located in Perrysburg, at 580 Craig Drive. An additional city location is at One
Michael Owens Way in Owens-Illinois Plaza Two.
David Seeger, president and CEO of Great Lakes, noted that the company has more than 4,000 customers.
According to its Web site, the company’s origins go back to 1940. The merger, Seeger said, provides St.
Rose customers with services like checking, home loans, mobile banking, text banking, and online
banking.