Carberry residents upset with BMO branch closure

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This article was published 23/01/2025 (239 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

After providing banking services in Carberry for more than a century, the BMO Bank of Montreal has told customers it will be closing its local branch, effective July 25.

The closure will pose a problem for many of the town’s residents and businesses, Carberry Mayor Ray Muirhead said.

“This came out of left field for us,” Muirhead said, “We’re trying to keep Carberry vibrant, so we have decided to fight back.”

Muirhead added he was made aware of the impending branch closure in a letter he received from BMO’s regional vice-president that was sent to the municipal office on Jan. 13, which was also forwarded to the Sun.

“This is right out of the blue with ‘this is what we’re doing,’” Muirhead said as he described the letter. It stated that the Carberry branch will be consolidating with the main branch in Brandon, located at 1000 Rosser Ave.

BMO stated in the letter it will hold an “informal session” March 5 at the Carberry branch to “meet with customers and discuss how we can assist them with their future banking needs,” adding that all customer bank accounts, loans and investments will automatically be transferred to the Brandon branch.

“They’ve never come out to consult us,” said Muirhead, adding, “They’ve never had any public meetings with any members and didn’t take into consideration the human factor, the history, or the rest of it.”

The original Bank of Montreal building was constructed in 1902 and still stands at 33 Main St. in Carberry. It has been declared a Municipal and Canadian Heritage site, but hasn’t been used as a bank since the late 1990s when BMO opened a new building just down the street.

Carberry’s current population is about 1,900, estimated Muirhead, with an additional 3,500 people residing in surrounding areas.

“We’re proud of our community,” he said. “We have a lot of farmers and high-end potato growers, who supply to the McCain plant. And we have all kinds of business owners and senior citizens who are not going to want to navigate Rosser Avenue in downtown Brandon to ask a question about their pension.”

Muirhead further said he also had concerns about safety in downtown Brandon, citing the assault that happened last Thursday on Rosser Avenue, when an elderly man was hit in the face with a baseball bat in broad daylight, as reported by the Sun.

The bank’s closure is “one more dagger in small-town life,” said Chris Holland, owner-operator of East End Service, the gas station and convenience store located in Carberry.

Holland said he received an email on Jan. 21 with the notice that his accounts would be transferred, which was seven days after Muirhead was informed. Holland has “multiple business accounts,” as well as personal ones, including his children’s.

“I had 12 letters in my mailbox Tuesday,” Holland said, “all from the Bank of Montreal, all saying the same thing.”

Not only is the branch closure going to be an inconvenience for the bank’s customers, Holland added, but it “will hurt the town” when people take their money elsewhere.

“It’s always been the logic to a lot of people that if they make a trip to Brandon for something, they might as well make it worth their while,” he said.

“So, that means they won’t be spending in town, they’ll be shopping at Walmart or Safeway,” said Holland, who also talked about safety concerns with having to “walk down Rosser Avenue with cash deposits.”

BMO continually assesses its operations including its branch network, “to adapt to changing consumer preferences for service delivery,” Jeff Roman, director of enterprise media relations, wrote in an email to the Sun.

Specific questions in two emails sent to BMO’s head of media relations and regional vice-president have gone unanswered since the first one was sent on Jan. 16.

Questions from the Sun included how many staff will be affected by the closure, what led to the decision to close the Carberry branch, and what is planned for the building once it’s vacant.

Muirhead said when he asked the regional vice-president about the building, he was told there had been no decision about its future.

“We’re not happy about this, and council is going to send a strongly worded letter to BMO and we’ll start a petition. I don’t know if we’ll be successful or not in this day and age, but we won’t go down without a fight.”

Referring to the last line of the letter, Muirhead read it out loud: “We’re proud to be part of the community. We look forward to seeing you at our new branch.”

“To me,” he said, “That is the bitter irony. We’re proud to be part of the community, but we’re moving and we’re closing the bank down.”

» mmcdougall@brandonsun.com

» X: @enviromichele