by David Flint
The Bank of America is leaving Berlin. T.J. Crawford, a spokesman for the company, confirmed that the bank will close on December 7. Crawford said the property will be put on the market. Sometimes such properties are bought by other banks, but there is no surety of that. The Bank of America branch in Averill Park was closed last April, but Crawford said there are no plans to close the branch in New Lebanon. The company, he said, is exploring the option of placing a full service ATM facility in Berlin after the bank is closed.
[private]There are currently four employees at the Berlin bank. Anne Maxon, who is also the Berlin Town Clerk, said that she has worked at that bank for 30 years. It was the Taconic Valley Bank when she started. In a series of acquisitions and mergers it later became Fleet Bank, then Norstar Bank and in 2005 the Bank of America. Crawford said that his company would provide outplacement assistance to employees, including finding other opportunities within the company.
Berlin Town Supervisor Rob Jaeger said he was not happy when informed by bank officials about the closing. He knows that people in Town are also not happy. Many who now walk to the bank, especially older folk, will be left with a problem, he said.
Jaeger said he would put feelers out to see if the Town could attract another bank to the location. With everything in place, including the parking lot, sale to another bank would be a turnkey process. Jaeger would prefer a New York commercial bank that holds its own mortgages. That’s something that the Bank of America did not do. Jaeger believes that indeed the Bank of America had gotten away from servicing the public.
Some have suggested a credit union might better serve the needs of local people, but Jaeger notes that the Town could not use a credit union for public investments. They must use a commercial bank.
“We’ve had a bank here for 107 years,” Jaeger said. “We’ll keep our fingers crossed.”
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