Talk to residents and stakeholders in comeback-trail East End about neighborhood necessities and the refrain is clear: we need a grocery store, pharmacy, healthcare facility and a bank. The first three are included in developer Anthony Stewart’s under construction Honey Locust Square project along Stratford Avenue.
Stewart, who built the adjacent public library, would love to add a bank branch to the mix.
In a letter to M&T Bank’s Chief Executive Officer René Jones, Mayor Joe Ganim writes “The East End is an underserved community that is in great need of banking services, and we are confident that people that live in the area would happily utilize a bank branch if one were available to them.”
Stewart who was raised in the East End says the project is back on track after stalling due to Covid and increased prices associated with the pandemic. The city, according to Ganim’s letter, recently made a $1 million investment to advance the project. Stewart is also anticipating support from the state.
If construction remains as currently scheduled, Stewart eyes a fall opening.
Last year Buffalo, New York-based M&T purchased People’s United Bank, the city’s preeminent financial institution. M&T’s footprint runs from New England to mid-Atlantic states.
City Councilman Ernie Newton, who represents the East End and was raised there, says a bank branch is key to neighborhood revitalization.
“It’s very important. Growing up we had banks. It just makes good sense for a new bank to show they are community oriented. It only enhances M&T’s image of a community bank.”
Excerpt from Ganim’s letter:
RUMOR MILL:
Overheard from Rene Jones, M&T Bank CEO —
If Mayor Ganim doesn’t stop telling me how to run my bank, I’m going to start telling him how to run his city! .
M&T Bank’s commitment to community relations is 24/7 and gets updated minute by minute.
Dial this number to discover the proof: *** 203 366 4242 ***
I trust that the body of this posting is actually a copy of a portion of the Mayor’s letter to Mr. Jones advocating for economic development in the form of a banking location in the East End of Bridgeport. The letter points to the fact that this section of Bridgeport, the East End, is an underserved community. Of course we have heard for more than a decade that the East End is also a “food desert” and that situation continues, it seems, but that is not on the Mayor’s mind at this moment.
To all readers of Only in Bridgeport, may I remind you that Bridgeport does have branch banks located within the community and also some full service food stores so that the entirety of the City is not a “food desert” or a “financial desert” either.
But the entire City is a FAIR Housing Commission and a FAIR Rent Commission desert, solely because the highest office holder in the City of Bridgeport has continuously ignored a Charter responsibility or duty by appointing folks to active terms serving fellow citizens. The only two boards or commissions with FAIR as part of their name have died in place. They no longer can create a forum for lack of appointments, do not meet, have agendas, or minutes. Who responds to City tenants, who are adults and voters, to explain why the City has become a desert of FAIR boards and commissions? Is there no photo-op in such appointments? Time will tell.
Lennie, it looks like your boy is on his way.
https://www.foxnews.com/politics/chicago-ousts-embattled-mayor-lori-lightfoot-race-heads-runoff-without-her
Good luck, Cortez, Gomes, Moore, and Daniel. I mean the Port.
I depart this freak show with the prophet.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CdfzMZ5A_90
RUMOR MILL:
Lennie Grimaldi knows when a good story is about to unfold and wants to be nearby. That’s why OIB is opening a remote branch office in the Bridgeport neighborhood of Chicago.
Read all about it: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bridgeport,_Chicago
As a retired bank employee, in order to justify a brick and mortar new bank, the banks require a current minimum amount of money on deposit within a specific mile radius of the location. Banks are in the business of making money, not necessarily viable in an underserved “needs” based location. Nice letter though.
The view from afar
Count on Jennifer Buchanan to understand banking regulations better than we do.
What the Mayor calls “underserved” others might call “undeserving”.
Don’t be surprised if M&T Bank overrides that rule — they have a lengthy time horizon when it comes to Bridgeport.
In a related matter, I wonder if M&T is still Bridgeport’s correspondent bank of if Mayor Ganim extracted those funds in response to M&T Bank’s troubled arrival.
Lennie?
As a retired bank employee, in order to justify a brick and mortar new bank, the banks require a current minimum amount of money on deposit within a specific mile radius of the location. Banks are in the business of making money, not necessarily viable in an underserved “needs” based location. Nice letter though Sparky.
The Bridgeport “banking deserts” have existed for years.
M&T Bank didn’t create any of them!