Texas CU kept operations going through Hurricane Ike
ALVIN, Texas (9/19/08)--Despite losing half its roof Friday night as Hurricane Ike blew through Texas, Chocolate Bayou Community CU maintained all electronic service operations through back-up systems.
The $70 million asset, Alvin, Texas-based credit union, was able to run on generator power from Friday night until 3 p.m. Wednesday when power was restored, Gary Davis, Chocolate Bayou CEO, told News Now Thursday.
Davis stayed in the credit union office Friday night and weathered the hurricane because the building is a staging area for an emergency response team for a chemical company that leases office space at Chocolate Bayou's Alvin location. "So I had to be there," Davis said.
"Our disaster recovery plan worked like clockwork," Davis said. "I sent our information technology people to Dallas last week so they could get us set up. They got us back up and running Monday with all our electronic services switched to back-up service. Nothing stopped processing.
"We started serving our members Tuesday," he added. "As far as I know, we were the only financial institution opened that fast in our area. I know of only one other bank open as of now, and it is located in a Wal-Mart."
On Tuesday, temporary replacement material was used to patch the missing half of the roof at the credit union, Davis said.
Several people, upon seeing that Chocolate Bayou was open for business Tuesday, told Davis that they were going to come back and open an account at the credit union because their financial institutions were still closed.
"I was somewhat surprised that about 40% of our service requests since the hurricane have been for deposits, not just withdrawals," Davis said. "I believe a lot of people had payroll checks because they got paid on Friday, right before the hurricane hit."
The credit union's staff and membership were "very fortunate" to have gotten through the hurricane well, Davis said.
"No staff were injured, although some sustained minor damage to their homes and some are still without power," he said. "Our membership seems to be doing very well."
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