Frontier Financial cutting 46 jobs
Published 10:52 pm Thursday, June 11, 2009
EVERETT — The parent company of Frontier Bank announced today that it’s cutting about 6 percent of its staff, about 46 people, because of the recession.
“This has been a difficult decision in difficult times, after having taken a number of actions over the past several months to lessen the size of a necessary reduction,” said Patrick Fahey, chairman and CEO of the Everett-based Frontier Financial Corp.
Fahey said in a news release that the cutbacks are part of an ongoing review of bank operations because of the downturn in the economy. He said the cutbacks occurred at all levels of the corporation.
Departing employees will receive severance pay based on their years of service and also will be offered a two-day career planning and job skills seminar. The bank also will offer departing employees the option of continuing their health care coverage for 24 months, rather than the 18 months typically available.
The reductions will amount to a $360,000 pre-tax charge on the company’s second quarter earnings, Fahey said.
Annually, the reductions should save the company about $2.5 million, he added.
During the first three months of the year, Frontier recorded a loss of $33.8 million, largely due to the need to set aside money to deal with growing loan losses.
