Contact Us    Locations    01/06/2009

MECHANICS MOVES PINOLE BRANCH OUT OF OLD TOWN

San Francisco Business Times - by Mark Calvey October 20, 2008—Richmond-based Mechanics Bank is relocating its Old Town Pinole branch to the Pinole Valley Shopping Center to better serve a community where the bank’s roots run deep.

Eddie Downer, grandfather of Mechanics Bank Chairman Eddie Downer III, founded the Bank of Pinole in 1905. With this month’s Pinole branch relocation, Mechanics Bank will continue to have two offices in the city of 19,000. Mechanics Bank’s Pinole Vista location at 1518 Fitzgerald Drive will remain open.

But Chairman Downer has mixed feelings on the closing of the Old Town location. After all, he’s the one that found the site and served at one time as the branch manager of the location that opened its doors in 1966. He notes that Mechanics Bank is already attracting interest from the city about redeveloping the bank’s Old Town site for housing.

The new Pinole location is in the higher-traffic Pinole Valley Shopping Center, also home to Trader Joe’s, Walgreens and other popular retailers. Downer speaks with pride about his grandfather’s role in building Pinole as a train station agent in the town’s early days. He also founded a weekly newspaper and other ventures in Pinole.

Today, Downer says Pinole holds a special place in his heart. “Pinole is still, in some ways, what you’d hope to find in a small town,” Downer said. “It’s a lovely place where people still know each other.”

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