West End residents rally in last-ditch effort to stop RBC from shuttering local bank branch
RBC branches at Sargent and Sherbrook, and at Main and James, to close this month
Residents of Winnipeg's West End are rallying in a last-ditch effort to stop the looming closure of one of the last neighbourhood banks as RBC prepares to close two branches in the city this month.
Community members held a protest at the corner of Sargent Avenue and Sherbrook Street on Thursday, repeating calls on RBC to halt plans to shutter its branch at that intersection July 10, a sign on the branch door says. The bank also plans to close its branch at 540 Main St. near City Hall on July 21.
"We are really struggling in this community to keep businesses going and to keep our bank," said Lynne Somerville, who has lived in the West End for about 45 years and relies on the Sargent branch.
"A lot of people in this area are elderly.… They don't have a car, a lot of people have walkers and wheelchairs and canes, so you need to be able to walk. A lot of people are on a fixed income."
The next closest RBC branch is a 20-minute walk away, south of Portage Avenue in the Manitoba Hydro downtown headquarters. Another, on Ellice Avenue west of Empress Street, is a 40-minute walk or 10-minute bus ride.
A TD branch on Notre Dame Avenue is the only other full-service bank in the West End.
The Sargent location has been Kurtis Mckenzie's home branch for years. He works at a pawn shop on Sargent that also uses the branch for business.
He is upset the nearest alternative branch will have him driving downtown and paying for parking.
"Also it's important for the pawn shop, because we get change from the bank … for our customers," he said. "There's a lot of reasons the bank should stay here, and I can't really understand the reasons why they wouldn't."
An RBC spokesperson sent CBC News a statement Thursday that included some of the exact same phrasing provided to media during June 20 coverage of the Sargent closure.
"Our branch network continually evolves and changes as we seek to serve our clients where and how they wish to conduct their banking," the statement says. "In some circumstances, this may involve combining branches, relocating certain branches, or opening new ones."
The statement suggests the decision to merge its Sargent and Main branches with its Ellice and Portage branches, respectively, came as "consumer banking habits have evolved" to include more of a mix of telephone and online banking on top of traditional branch services and mobile expert advisors.
Ralph Bryant attended a meeting with the RBC branch manager two weeks ago about community concerns.
Bryant is a newer resident of the West End and said the loss of the Sargent RBC branch is effectively a "tax on the poor," because it will mean people on tight budgets are spending more to bus to the Ellice or Portage locations.
"When you think about what makes a community, it's first and foremost the people, but it's also the resources and access to the things that they need, so they don't feel like they have to leave the neighbourhood," he said.
"That's a $7 bus ride there and back, which for people on fixed incomes, for people who are worried about their bank accounts and keeping the money that they have, spending $7 just to do their basic banking is a lot."
Local municipal, provincial and federal representatives — Coun. Cindy Gilroy (Daniel McIntyre), MLA Uzoma Asagwara (Union Station) and MP Leah Gazan (Winnipeg Centre) — all penned letters between the end of May and mid-June in an attempt to stop the closure.
Asagwara still hasn't heard back from RBC, they said at the protest Thursday.
"Having access to a local bank is fundamentally important for neighbourhoods. It helps support the local businesses in the community that keep our community thriving, and it supports all the folks in our neighbourhood who, really, banking in person is the way they meet their financial needs," they said.
"The loss of this bank is going to have a huge impact on the community as a whole, and so I am hoping RBC listens to the voices of Union Station and reverses their decision."
Gazan said she hasn't heard back from federal Finance Minister François-Philippe Champagne since sending him her letter, dated May 26, asking him to intervene.
She said she is even more disappointed with RBC since she learned it will also close its Main branch location.
"This is a crisis, especially for people that don't have vehicles, seniors, many newcomer families, in fact, that rely on these banks … to even set up bank accounts in our community," she said. "It's highly disappointing."
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With files from Radio-Canada's Juliette Straet and CBC's Ian Froese