Haydenville bank branch future unclear after merger

By OWEN BOSS

Staff Writer

WILLIAMSBURG - The future of the Legacy Bank branch office on Main Road is unclear, following the bank's announcement it plans to merge with Berkshire Bank.

On Dec. 22, the two companies signed a definitive merger agreement stating that Berkshire Bank plans to acquire Legacy Bancorp Inc. and its subsidiary, Legacy Banks, in a transaction valued at approximately $108 million.

On Friday, Laurie Gazzillo, spokeswoman for Legacy Bank, said that officials with both banks are still working toward getting paperwork approved before changes can be made.

"We just announced the agreement to merge so there is still a lot of regulatory filing that has to occur before anything can be officially approved," Gazzillo said. "That is why we have no information about any individual branch offices at this time."

The next step in the process, she said, will be gaining the Department of Justice's stamp of approval on the applications they have submitted. A ruling could be months away.

According to a press release issued by Gazzillo, the merger of Legacy into Berkshire would create a combined institution with about $4 billion in assets. Both banks, she said, have branch offices located across western Massachusetts and northeastern New York.

Legacy has nearly $1 billion in assets and 19 branches; Berkshire, which is also working to acquire the New York-based Rome Savings Bank, has nearly $3 billion in assets and will have 47 branches when the pending transaction with Rome Bancorp. is complete.

"Legacy and Berkshire have been friendly competitors over the years and now we're joining the Berkshire team to create a larger combined platform to serve our traditional and target markets," J. Williar Dunlaevy, Legacy bank's president and CEO, said in a statement.

Echoing Dunlaevy's optimism was Berkshire Bank President and CEO Michael P. Daly, who laid out the bank's planned expansion over the next 12 months. "We expect to complete our pending our pending merger with Rome Bancorp in the first quarter of 2011 and to complete the Legacy merger in the following quarter."

Owen Boss can be reached at oboss@gazettenet.com.