Bank emergency plan
includes borough site

By Tom Morphet

In the event of an emergency, you may be doing your banking in the borough assembly chambers.

That’s the premise behind a draft agreement between First National Bank of Anchorage and the Haines Borough regarding disasters.

Under new requirements of the federal Office of Comptroller of Currency, the bank has to identify in writing a place of operation in case it “experiences a sudden occurrence of an event which destroys or severely damages” its building, rendering it unusable.

FNBA chose the borough’s public safety building, which houses the police station, fire department, assembly chambers, a state jail, and some offices rented by the borough. Borough and bank attorneys are working on an agreement for the arrangement.

“We had to find something in Haines that met their criteria as a safe place and there weren’t a lot of other places that met that criteria,” said Karl Heinz, branch manager for FNBA.

Under the draft agreement, the borough would provide a desk and chair or an office space large enough for them, with adequate space for a teller station and locking drawers, as well as space for storage of a bank vault for overnight storage of cash.

The bank would reimburse any costs incurred by the borough.

Heinz was asked why a private location – such as his home – wasn’t chosen as an alternative bank location. “As a customer, that’s probably not the most professional setting, as opposed to a formal public building.”

Heinz said he couldn’t say what valuables would be stored at the emergency location or whether Haines police would be obligated to protect the bank’s cash. “It’s a contingency plan that’s required to be in place, and hopefully we’ll never have to use it.”

Borough manager Tom Bolen said the bank’s vault might be kept in an unoccupied jail cell. “That was my thinking about it. A jail cell is supposed to be secure. The only problem might be if all the cells were full (at the time of an emergency).”

Bolen said he’s not sure which room at the hall would serve as bank office, but the assembly chambers would probably most closely replicate the bank lobby.

FNBA’s Heinz said in most communities banks make reciprocal agreements with other banks to serve as alternate sites, but as Haines only has one bank, that’s not an option here.

Karen Fink, assistant bank vice-president for special projects, said Haines and Healy are FNBA’s only two locations where another bank wasn’t available as an alternative site. The Healy bank will use a school site, she said.

Though it’s unlikely a bank backup site would ever be necessary, it’s important bank services aren’t interrupted during an emergency, Fink said. “We are a critical infrastructure key resource, banking is,” one of 17 recognized by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, she said.

Neither Heinz nor Fink were worried that, under the plan, the bank vault would be in the same building that houses convicted criminals. In Glenallen, the bank abuts a jail, Fink said.