May 15, 2025
The Summit held its annual meeting virtually and in person on May 14, 2025. Board Chair Chris Modesti, and President and CEO Laurie Baker reflected on a tremendous year of growth for 2025 and outlined the vision for the organization moving forward.
In his message to a hybrid audience of board members, employees, and members, Chris Modesti commented, “Financially, the credit union had a remarkable year. We reported the highest asset growth since 2020, with an increase of $91 million or 7%. This is why we are able to continuously offer our members competitive interest rates on loans, and often higher-than-market rates on savings products.”
In talking about The Summit’s community engagement initiatives for 2024, Laurie Baker remarked, “In 2024, our initiatives reached the highest levels of impact in our history. We supported 189 organizations with our time and talent as well as our monetary donations, reflecting over 1,100 hours spent in our communities – in classrooms, at festivals and events, and employment fairs. Each of these interactions and partnerships directly related to the overarching credit union philosophy of ‘people helping people.’”
Three of The Summit’s volunteers were recognized for their years of service to the credit union: Tim Smith (5 years); and Elizabeth Dudman and Clarence “Chip” Turner (30 years).
The Summit also presented college scholarships to five graduating seniors who are pursuing higher education. The recipients of this year’s scholarships are Hannah Bouwens (Homer High School, Homer, NY); Adalyn Cross (Our Lady of Mercy School for Young Women, Rochester); David DeRoo-Kury (Brighton High School); Emily McMichael (Greece Athena High School), and Victor Wong.
The Summit’s board members include Chris Modesti (DeJoy & Co. LLP), Chair; Mollene Benison (DeJoy & Co. LLP) and Pamela Crocker (The Vanguard Group, Inc.), Vice Chairs; Kate Sweeney (Rochester Institute of Technology), Secretary; Kofi Appiah Okyere (Syracuse University), Treasurer; Elizabeth Dudman (ret. University of Rochester); Gerald Gebauer (ret. JBG Freight Lines); Orlando Ortiz (RocOn Property Management); Thomas Quirk (ret. Bausch & Lomb); Clarence Turner (Rochester Institute of Technology); Daryl Wolf (ret. Wegmans Food Markets); and Emeritus Board Members Augustin Melendez (ret. Hillside Family of Agencies), William Reifsteck (ret. Rochester Telephone Corporation), and Sarah Sorensen (AT&T).
The organization’s fiscal year ended on December 31st and audited results, as well as details on our community impact for 2024 are available at: summitfcu.org/about-us/.