Residents unimpressed by BMO presentation in Northbrook

Jeff Green | Jun 07, 2023

They brought cookies and bottled water, but did not garner much good will.

A large crowd of BMO customers and other community members came to the Northbrook Lions Hall on Wednesday, May 31, to hear from a panel-led regional Vice President, Julie Sehl.

The panel made it clear, as had already been communicated to bank clients, that the branch is slated for closure and there is no turning back.

The business decision was taken on a corporate level, and the main purpose of the meeting from the BMO point of view was to respond to questions and concerns from customers. The accounts of those who remain with BMO will be transferred to the Tweed branch.

The audience was not interested in discussing the changeover. They were interested, however, in the opportunity to express their unhappiness with the move, to bank officials in person.

“How could you do this?” “Why would you do this, and in such a secretive, authoritarian way!” “Did you not know of the population’s lucrative increase in this area?”  “Why would you treat us like this?” were all typical of the questions that were asked.

At one point there was a heated moment when an audience member claimed that BMO is a public company and should act in such a way, and a bank official claimed that BMO is a private entity.

The audience member pointed out that BMO stock is publicly traded on the Toronto and New York stock exchanges, and the official said, yes, in that sense BMO is a public company.

The panelists indicated that the decision “was years in the making”. The building that housed the branch has been listed for sale with the realtor Rogers and Trainor for $199,000.

The listing includes a for sale and for lease component, and says there is an “opportunity to leave ATM in place for additional income stream” and lists October 1st as the availability date.”

While BMO is leaving Northbrook, they do not want to encourage another bank to take their place, at least not in the location they are vacating.

The News has confirmed that there is a long ‘restrictive covenant’ attached to the listing, which says that for 20 years, “no bank, trust company, credit union, loan company, cheque cashing (or pay day loan) operation, stock brokerage or investment dealer, financial planner or other person, firm or corporation which carries on the business of banking, deposit gathering, lending, investment dealing and advice, stock brokerage services, financial planning, sale of investment products and services or estate planning and portfolio management, or other financial services (or any component thereof), and no automatic banking machine or device, the purpose of which is to provide any banking or financial service of any kind whatsoever, shall be or shall be permitted to be located or operated on any part or parts of the property.”

The meeting last week ended quietly, with plenty of cookies and water remaining unclaimed.

“We, the valued customers, got nothing as a takeaway,” one of the bank’s customers told the News after the meeting.