The Akron, Ohio-based FirstMerit Bank will lay off 135 employees at its downtown Flint office – the former headquarters of Citizens Bank.
The bank filed a Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification Act notice with the Michigan Development Agency on Aug. 30, 2013, notifying the state that the layoffs would take place within a 14-day period of Oct. 31, 2013.
The most recent numbers prior to the sale indicated that there were approximately 600 employees working at the downtown Flint location.
According to FirstMerit Bank spokesperson Rob Townsend, when the bank’s $912 million stock-for-stock purchase of Citizens became final in April, all affected employees were told that the future of their jobs was unknown, but the company would retain the majority of employees at the location.
“We’ve been communicating this since earlier this year and we’ve been pretty open about it, so it shouldn’t come as news. What we’re communicating now are end dates to positions which we’ve discussed from the beginning may not be with us. It’s not an out-of-the-blue statement,” Townsend said.
“Earlier this year after we legally closed, we communicated to all of the employees that their positions might not be retained after we converted the operating systems and we’re nearly finished with that transition now.”
Also according to Townsend, many of the positions were overlapping administrative and operations positions, and employees being laid off will receive severance packages with out-care services and health care continuation.
Aside from the workers directly affected by the layoffs, downtown business owners will also take a hit as a result of the layoffs.
Bob Kittel is the owner of the Mad Hatter – a store located just a few doors down from FirstMerit on South Saginaw Street.
Kittel said that he was preparing for the reduction in employees, but was unsure how many people would be laid off as a result of FirstMerit’s acquisition of Citizens.
“One hundred and thirty-five fewer people downtown will certainly affect walk-in business. I’m sure it’ll be a big loss for all of us – restaurants, stores, the city’s tax base. We never really heard a number of layoffs, so I really didn’t know what to expect, but this is a bunch of people who won’t be here after the month,” Kittel said.
“Hopefully, some of those sales can be made up with business from the new Genesys building downtown, Michigan State once it’s in and maybe a few more from the Riverfront Residence Hall.”