Credit unions helped Main Street America through the Paycheck Protection Program (PPP), CUNA wrote to the House Small Business Subcommittee on Oversight, Investigations, and Regulations Wednesday. The subcommittee conducted a hearing reviewing the PPP.

“[C]redit unions were proud to offer PPP loans to help small business owners recover from the impact of the pandemic, facilitating more than 170,000 loans that averaged just $49,000. Our largest credit unions and our smallest credit unions participated in this program,” the letter reads, adding that credit unions put significant resources into the PPP to ensure loans were processes.

CUNA notes that small businesses remain in need of capital and credit unions are in a position to pump billions in capital into the economy - at no cost to the government.

“There’s only one obstacle: an arbitrary credit union Member Business Lending (MBL) cap which currently limits credit union lending activity to 12.25% of assets,” the letter reads. “As the Subcommittee continues to focus on empowering small community lenders, such as credit unions, to continue to provide credit to small businesses, it’s critical that Congress remove the MBL cap.

“We believe that community financial institutions the life blood of communities across the country and that the PPP program has demonstrated that credit unions’ ability to lend to small business should be enhanced so that small businesses can continue to prosper,” it adds.