The tiny town of Darrington may not get its first drive-up ATM. But the town will have a bank.
Everett-based Coastal Community Bank plans to open a Darrington branch as soon as Aug. 1.
Earlier this month, Bank of America announced it would shut its doors in the Snohomish County communities of Darrington and Sultan in September.
Sultan already has a second bank, Coastal Communty. But Bank of America’s departure would have forced Darrington residents to drive 30 miles to Arlington to do their banking.
Now that won’t happen.
Coastal told community leaders and the Darrington business community last weekthat it plans to have a storefront on Highway 530 before Bank of America’s closure on Sept. 9.
Because Darrington is required to make daily deposits of city receipts and a lot of businesses would have no place to pick up change, “it was getting to be a little scary,” Darrington Mayor Joyce Jones said.
“They’re fairly committed,” Jones said Saturday. “They seem to be oriented for some small-town businesses, and that’s what we need right now.
“We need to grow up, and we’re having some growth problems, so it’s really refreshing to think that someone likes us,” Jones said.
Randy Ashe, owner of the town’s grocery store, Darrington IGA, helped coordinate the first meeting with Coastal representatives and town business leaders. He was pleased that those meetings turned into a promise from Coastal, a bank he called “really community minded.”
Coastal has six mostly rural branches in the north Puget Sound area.
Ashe also said Coastal’s coming to town would mean keeping more local money spent locally.
“Probably 50 percent of the folks in town are banking out of town because they don’t like dealing with BOA,” Ashe said. “Maybe we can draw some of those accounts back into town and keep business locally, because if mom goes out of town to do banking, she’s probably doing shopping there, too.”
And the burden of having to make daily deposits 30 miles away every day was not sitting well.
“The local businesses would either have to get together and hire a courier or we’d be running wheels off our vehicles,” Ashe said.
As for Coastal opening up the town’s first drive-up ATM, everyone says that’s the talk.
“Next is a red light, and when that happens, I’ll have to leave,” Ashe said. “No, when the first fast food joint opens up here is when I’m gone.”
Assistant city editor Theresa Goffredo: 425-339-3097 or goffredo@heraldnet.com.
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