Mary Boyle is a depositor at Huntington Bank. Back in October 2023, she came home one day to some unwelcome news.
Her local bank in Cleveland's Buckeye neighborhood would be one of the 34 branches closing in Ohio by Feb. 9, 2024, a letter said, citing a spike in violent crime in the area.
Boyle had seen businesses leave Buckeye for years. She noticed a pattern: when businesses leave Buckeye, their departure affects the neighborhoods they leave and the residents who remain, which forces even more businesses to depart. She grew fed up with the cycle and didn’t want her bank to leave.
“I came to this branch because it made a commitment to the neighborhood 15 or 20 years ago,” Boyle recalled. “So if it thought it was worthwhile coming 15 or 20 years ago, then I think it's worth being here now.”
Boyle decided to take action. She brought up her concern at a Buckeye Neighborhood Network Night at Our Lady of Peace in Shaker Square.
“And to my surprise, all kinds of other people in that meeting said, ‘You're right, let's go tell them that we want the bank to stay open,’” Boyle said.
Buckeye organizers got to work. They held community meetings to recruit volunteers. They reached out to their elected officials and the media, then held meetings with bank officials. Police created an action plan to patrol the area.
Organizers went door-knocking in the middle of the winter to get signatures for a petition, receiving over 1,000 signatures in just a few months. They even created a documentary to get the word out about what the bank meant to the neighborhood.
Finally, in August, their efforts paid off. Huntington decided to reinstate the Buckeye Road branch. The bank declined an interview for this story, but said in a statement, “We look forward to continuing our investment in this historic neighborhood."
Organizers are celebrating their win, as their branch is the only one scheduled to reopen. But restoring closing institutions has happened in Buckeye before, said Tamara Chappelle, a retiree-turned-organizer.
“Keep in mind, this same group, when the post office closed, it took us a year,” Chappelle said with a big grin. “The post office is open and we planted a tree. We have a tree we are ready to plant in front of the [bank] when they open up.”
Race, discrimination and financial exclusion
But Huntington is not returning to business as usual in Buckeye. Organizers are calling on Huntington to invest in the community and restore the trust it may have broken by leaving.
According to a survey from Case Western Reserve University, 88% of Buckeye residents are African-American and about half of residents have an income of less than $20,000. Like many other majority-Black and impoverished neighborhoods, Buckeye residents have seen their fair share of discrimination.
Buckeye has been redlined by financial institutions in the past, said Rev. Jimmy Gates of Zion Hill Baptist Church. Redlining is the practice of denying financial services or assets to primarily Black neighborhoods.
“We're an urban community, we got poor people in the community, but we should not be redlined,” Gates said. “We should not be placed in a category where we can't get the same benefits that somebody else gets."
Practices like redlining not only led to the wealth gap between Black and White Americans, but also made generations of Black Americans wary of financial institutions. Black households are more likely to be unbanked, with many citing mistrust as the primary reason, according to FDIC data.
Black Americans’ history of financial exclusion affects their trust in banks, said Michael Neal, a senior fellow at the Urban Institute in Washington, D.C.
“You cannot operate a financial system without trust, so this trust is critical,” Neal said. “What we have seen historically is that there are instances in which Black people have been harmed by actions taken by specific financial institutions.”
Huntington’s planned departure would have impacted another vulnerable community: senior citizens. Though most financial transactions happen online, there are still members of the community who rely on physical bank branches, said Bob Render, president of the E. 128th Street Block Club and a member of the Ward 6-T precinct committee.
“You have seniors in all these neighborhoods throughout the City of Cleveland who don't have cars,” Render said. “They don't have internet access so you could do your transaction over on your cell phone. They can walk to the bank.”
Huntington's future in Buckeye
Even with a history of economic inequality, many believe that Huntington has an opportunity to right some historic wrongs. Julian Khan, an organizer and Buckeye resident, said that Huntington can work with the community to improve it.
“Not only did we retain the bank, but we also focused on some specific bank products to help galvanize homeownership and wealth retention in the neighborhood,” Khan said. “Does it fix all of our issues, our systemic issues? Of course not. But it's good to know that we have a new partner and new ally to help us realize the realities here.”
That’s if the branch can stay open long-term. Nationally, with the rise of online banking, the number of bank branches is about 20% lower than it was in 2009, and hundreds more shut down every year.
By rebuilding that relationship, Huntington can regrow its local trust while keeping the branch operational. Relationships between customers and banks could benefit both parties, said Lakshmi Balasubramanyan, an associate professor of finance at Case Western Reserve University.
“If there is still economies of scale and there are members of the community who are actively coming into the bank and utilizing these services, that would be an indication that you keep your bank branches in these communities," Balasubramanyan said.
Many of the organizers suggested that Huntington should show its investment with home loans, new purchases and refinancing. Chappelle has a few new ideas to address some of the economic issues some residents are facing.
“I think they should do little classes teaching people about saving credit ratings, because that is not something that they do in the schools,” Chappelle suggested. “And no, you're not going to drive down to someplace else to do it when it's right here in your community. I would like the bank to take a real role.”
Khan noted that Huntington has shown its commitment to the Cleveland Browns after announcing a 20-year stadium naming rights agreement. Now, he said it's time for Huntington to show that same level of commitment to Buckeye and neighborhoods like it.
“People matter, you know, as simple as that,” he said. “The talent is everywhere. It's just the fact that the opportunities aren't, is what complicates things.”
The bank is slated to reopen in October, a year after the letter was sent out to depositors about its closing, and Chappelle is getting ready to plant the tree to symbolize the community’s resolve.
