In a near unanimous vote, the 150 members of the 54-year-old financial cooperative at a special meeting on Tuesday approved Intermountain's merger into the giant Ogden-based America First Credit Union.

"Beginning immediately, we will begin integrating Intermountain's administrative staff, its members accounts and its assets with our own," said Rex Rollo, America First's chief financial officer.

America First has assets of $4.5 billion, making it the nation's 12th largest, while Intermountain had $41 million in assets.

Intermountain's approximately 6,900 members will be contacted by America First in coming weeks with their new account numbers, Rollo said, adding that the amalgamation of the two credit unions should be completed by the end of the year.

"All and all, this is a positive step for our members and staff," said Jeff Blackburn, Intermountain's president.

"It [the merger] is something you hate to go through, but the goal was to protect the members and that is what happened."

Faced with declining net income and troublesome real estate construction loans, Intermountain approached America First earlier this year and asked for its help and advice in working through its financial difficulties.

Under the urging of auditors from the National Credit Union Administration, which oversees federal deposit insurance for credit unions, America First and Intermountain quickly realized a merger was necessary.

Intermountain's board approved the combination with America First on July 31. After the NCUA gave its permission for the "emergency merger," Utah regulators gave conditional approval a little over two weeks ago.

The Utah Department of Financial Institutions, which agreed to the merger provided Intermountain's members voted to support the deal, said the combination will officially take place at the end of the business day Friday.

"All we are waiting for now is a letter from Intermountain stating the merger has been completed," said department commissioner Ed Leary.

steve@sltrib.com