When Greg Gannon started his work at DeWitt Bank & Trust in DeWitt, Iowa, he did not expect to one day play a leading role in refugee resettlement in the town of 5,500 people.
After the outbreak of the Russia-Ukraine war in February 2022, the rural community welcomed Ukrainian immigrants and Gannon wanted to help. He knew the community did not have many affordable housing options, so he took his connections from banking and helped investors pull together a limited liability company to buy some homes.
Refugee families now live in the homes while they find jobs and embed themselves into the DeWitt community.
“From our standpoint [as investors], it was mostly organizing, raising the funds, identifying and purchasing a couple of properties and spending some time on ongoing maintenance,” Gannon said. “We have 21 investors in our LLC. When the program winds down and the homes are no longer needed, we’ll sell the homes and return all the capital back to our investors. We’re not in this to make money. Our thought was, by pooling our money together, we could probably do more good.”
Once families settle in the community, many turn their finances to a trusted banker: Gannon.
“Since I was already familiar with the program, process and the housing, most immigrants have established bank relationships at our bank,” he said. “Our employees learned and got comfortable with verifying identities — as required by federal law — getting accounts established, and then working with the language barrier. I think we’ve become the primary, go-to bank for the immigrants to get their banking relationships established.”
Gannon is not alone. Community banks play an essential role in the settling of immigrants within rural communities, from helping them set up bank accounts to eventually assisting them in getting loans for businesses or homes.
Just 3 1/2 percent of workers in rural areas are immigrants compared to 14.9 percent in urban areas, according to the Federal Reserve Bank of Richmond. Recent immigrants do not always have the documents necessary to open a bank account, like a Social Security number or a U.S. ID, said Greg Raymo, CEO of First State Bank Southwest in Worthington, Minn.
Raymo, who retired as CEO on Dec. 31 but continues to serve on the bank’s board, said his main job when it comes to helping immigrants settle in is to help build trust in financial institutions when some have had negative experiences in their home countries.
“We have done educational sessions here at the bank or outreach where we send out people to the meat processing plant to meet with workers there and try to help them understand the benefits of banking and the safety piece,” he said. “As we’ve been here now for two decades, it has really transitioned. The next generation of immigrants have accepted the banking industry.”
Raymo said his bank has many bilingual employees to ensure customers — who speak more than 62 dialects — feel comfortable banking with the team. When needed, bank employees also utilize translation apps to help customer communications.
Technology has been an asset to many communities when it comes to translation, including at Beardstown Savings in Beardstown, Ill. President and CEO Rich Eckert’s wife told him about a service that would break language barriers for him and monolingual staff members to use to better understand their clientele.
“Up until that time, Worldwide Tech Connections had only been in the education sector,” Eckert said. “I got in touch with them and we came to an agreement and have used it ever since. Do we use it every day? No, but for me, it lets me sleep a little bit better at night knowing in a pinch when we don’t have anybody to translate, we have a way to always communicate with our customer base.”
The service has revolutionized the bank’s work, he said, and has allowed employees to better meet the needs of its diverse community that sees Central American and French African immigrants.
“The different cultures and groups have different experiences and cultural norms, so it is important for us to recognize those and embrace them and then help as much as we can,” Eckert said.
How immigration changes rural towns
While rural communities continue to change, immigrants help rejuvenate the area and create businesses that would otherwise never appear, Raymo said.
Many immigrants and their children have saved up to pursue their entrepreneurial dreams, he said, and allowed the community to foster new ideas and interests over time.
“In the last 20 years, we have discovered as a bank that these immigrants come with incredible entrepreneurship skills and have a huge desire to improve themselves,” he said. “Back in the early 2000s, we had a lot of opportunities to finance startup businesses for many immigrants and, 20 years later, now we’re helping them grow their businesses after being successful.”
He said he hopes to see more businesses open, grow and diversify to meet the needs of the 13,600-person community.
“Working with them and helping [immigrants] is a true opportunity for not only larger communities, but for rural communities that are looking for growth and economic advantage,” he said.
As more Ukrainians arrive in DeWitt either permanently or temporarily, Gannon said the community has strengthened around the new residents.
The Iowa Bankers Association also connected Gannon with other bankers looking to play similar roles in relocation and immigration in their communities following his success. He said DeWitt Bank & Trust is now a part of a larger community bank network that helps one another learn how to accurately assist immigrants and refugees.
He said he hopes more bankers will contact him if they are curious about helping Ukrainians settle in their communities because there is still a larger need.
“They’re truly looking for a safer life, they’re looking to others to help,” Gannon said. “We have this program and if anybody feels the humanitarian need or wants to help out, there is a way to do it well.”
Eckert believes community banks are uniquely positioned to offer additional support to new migrants or refugees, especially when they’ve helped before. Once bank employees understand regulations and some of the needs of new customers from other countries, they are ready to spring into action.
In Beardstown, some children of immigrants are beginning to work for Eckert’s bank, allowing the community to see more friendly faces in the office who give back to where they grew up.
“It’s huge when somebody comes into our bank and understands our community and understands the dynamics of the diversity we have,” Eckert said. “There are a lot of good, positive stories and interactions and opportunities that come from serving your whole community instead of worrying about what you’re comfortable with. I think the more we embrace that as a community bank, as community leaders, makes us have a greater reach and impact.”