Chase Bank Opens In A New Location

By Kaaren Valenta

Chase Manhattan Bank opened at its new location, 30 Church Hill Road, on Monday, kicking off two weeks of grand opening events.

Customers are being feted this week with fresh bagels and coffee (from next-door neighbor Bagelman). A breakfast meeting for the Newtown Chamber of Commerce is planned for 8 am on Tuesday, November 28; and a grand opening cocktail reception for customers will be held on Thursday, December 7, from 5:30 to 7:30 pm.

“We’re so proud of our new location,” said Branch Manager Joan Lavery. “It’s larger than our former location [at 1 Commerce Road] and very convenient. We have more safety deposit boxes, a large, enclosed foyer for the ATM machine, and a well-lit parking lot.”

The move brings the branch closer to the business district and its layout provides more privacy to its banking customers.

Chase currently has 31 branches in Connecticut, primarily in Fairfield County. It opened the Newtown branch in 1991, the same year it first came into Connecticut, in the Commerce Road site that formerly held a CityTrust branch.

Chase recently invested more than $2 million in the renovation of its space at 999 Broad Street in Bridgeport to serve as the regional headquarters for its Connecticut staff, which includes more than 100 commercial banking, municipal, trust, human resources, community development, and retail employees

An additional 300 employees work in the branch network, including seven in the Newtown branch. Chase is a market leader in small business and commercial banking in Connecticut and supports communities and cultural development through such programs as the Washington Park Renovation, economic revitalization of downtown Bridgeport, and the Chase Summer Concert Series.

With more than $425 billion in assets, Chase is one of the world’s largest financial services institutions, with operations in 60 countries around the world. Chase has top-tier rankings in all areas of investment banking, asset management, private banking, trading, and global markets activities, as well as information and transaction processing. Chase is a leading provider of financial solutions to large corporations, government entities, commercial banking clients, small businesses, and individuals, and has relationships with more than 30 million consumers across the United States. Chase can be reached on the Web at www.chase.com.

Last year the bank celebrated its 200th anniversary. It was born in 1799 to help solve a crisis – not a financial crisis, but a health crisis. The citizens of New York, threatened by yellow fever carried into the port city by ships from the tropics, petitioned the City Council for relief. The scourge had felled hundreds, and many believed that the untreated public water supply was responsible. The city council hastily drew up a bill to create a municipal water company, but Aaron Burr and former Treasure Secretary Alexander Hamilton argued that the council should entrust the task of supplying water in the city to a private corporation. On March 27, 1799, a bill to create The Manhattan Company was presented to the State Legislature for approval. The Legislature inserted a provision into the bill that allowed The Manhattan Company to use any of its capital stock not required in the water business “in the purchase of public stock or in any other monied transactions or operations not inconsistent with the Constitution and laws of the United States.” This paved the way for the establishment of a bank that through a series of mergers throughout the following 200 years became what is known today as Chase.

The Newtown branch, No 661, is a full-service bank with high-yield savings accounts, certificates of deposit, checking with interest, money market accounts, home equity products, general consumer loans and lines (including auto and personal), overdraft lines of credit, several types of credit cards, mortgages, financial investment services, and online banking. A convenient drive-through window is located on the side of the building adjacent to Lexington Gardens, and a 24-hour automated teller machine provides around-the-clock access to accounts.

There are seven branch employees: Mrs Lavery, Barbara Williams, Mary C. Mancini, Cindy Bennett, Dolores Grundman, Kathy Ellis, Sandra Martino, plus a mortgage specialist and an investment specialist.

The branch hours are Monday through Thursday, 8:30 am to 3:30 pm; Friday, 8:30 am to 5 pm; Saturday, 8:30 am to noon. For more information, call 426-6945.