Members of SELCO Community Credit Union from Fort Rock to Silver Lake learned Monday that SELCO plans to close its Christmas Valley branch March 26.

The branch office, the only brick-and-mortar financial institution between Burns, Lakeview and La Pine, leaves business owners wondering where to find a source of cash for their daily operations, as well as a place to make deposits.

“I’m still a customer of SELCO at the moment; we’re tightly wound with them,” said Patti Duff, manager at Rockhorse Park at Horse Ranch, a campground in Fort Rock. “I’d have to untangle a lot of things to change banks, although my knee-jerk reaction is to abandon them like they’ve abandoned us.”

Duff received an email notice Monday from Bob Newcomb, president and CEO of the Eugene-based credit union, announcing the closure. “Despite our best efforts, the cost of maintaining a physical location in the community is unsustainable,” the email states, “leaving us with the difficult decision to close this location.”

SELCO Marketing Manager Colleen Thompson wrote by email Tuesday that SELCO “absorbed significant operating losses while we looked for ways to reduce costs and maintain services.” However, she wrote, “this is a common challenge for financial institutions serving rural communities, and ultimately we concluded that it’s not financially feasible to maintain our branch operations in Christmas Valley.”

SELCO acquired the branch when it merged with Greater Oregon Federal Credit Union in July 2013, according to The Bulletin archives. SELCO, chartered in 1936, has $1.2 billion in assets and nearly 114,000 members, according to the National Credit Union Administration. Thompson said SELCO has about 650 members in Christmas Valley, Fort Rock, Silver Lake and Summer Lake.

She wrote that SELCO members have access to online and mobile banking, including mobile check deposit and other services. “We’re working one-on-one with our Christmas Valley members to help them find the options that will work best for them,” Thompson wrote.

For a handful of small businesses in Christmas Valley, the credit union is the place to make deposits, cash checks and pay employees. Losing the branch means traveling 150 miles round-trip to La Pine or 200 miles or more to financial institutions in Burns, Lakeview or Bend and back for those services.

Shari Blackman, owner of Fort Rock Restaurant & Pub, said she regularly drives to Christmas Valley to make deposits. Her six employees automatically deposit their paychecks to SELCO.

“But for us,” she said, “from Christmas Valley to town (Bend) is 100 miles.”

Julie Sutherland, owner with her husband, Chuck, of Sagewood Grocery, in Christmas Valley, said they learned Tuesday the branch would close.

“My husband and I are discussing it and trying to decide what we’re going to do,” Sutherland said. “We have to make sure we have change every day. … It will be a challenge, for sure, for all the business owners out here.”

Thompson said the credit union took member businesses’ need for cash into account. “We are helping them to understand alternatives including cash delivery vendors, like Loomis or Brinks, who may be able to offer those services,” she wrote Tuesday.

Jasmine Warmington works at a cafe in Fort Rock, but she does her personal banking at SELCO in Christmas Valley, where she also gets other supplies, she said. Losing the credit union could take a bite out of the local economy, Warmington said.

“That’s about the only place to get fuel,” she said. “You go there for a few different things: fuel, groceries, banking, and they won’t have that anymore. You’ll have to go to La Pine.”

— Reporter: 541-617-7815, jditzler@bendbulletin.com