Metro Profile: Skagit and Island County

Skagit & Island Commercial Banking Team’s Community Roots Run Deep

BY JOHN STEARNS

The five bankers who make up the Skagit/Island commercial team for Heritage Bank have deep-rooted connections to the northwest Washington communities they serve.

They have a combined 110 years with Heritage and Whidbey Island Bank, which Heritage acquired in 2014. That’s an average of 22 years per person.

“A lot of us were born and raised here, too, so we’re definitely committed to this area,” said Kurt Swanson, senior vice president-commercial banking team leader, who heads the group from Heritage’s Burlington office and was born and raised in nearby Mount Vernon.

He’s joined in the Burlington office by John Hanstad, senior vice president, and Matt Lehman, vice president. Hanstad was also born and raised in Mount Vernon, and Lehman grew up in Burlington.

The team’s other two commercial bankers are Krista Oicles, assistant vice president, and Megan Wise, senior vice president. Oicles works out of the Anacortes branch and serves San Juan Island from the Friday Harbor branch. Wise is in the Oak Harbor branch on Whidbey Island, which retained its Whidbey Island Bank name, as a division of Heritage, after the merger.

Wise leads the team in years with the organization, at 28. She’s followed by Hanstad, 27; Oicles, 21; Lehman, 19; and Swanson, 15. “We have a lot of tenure on this team,” Swanson said.

The team’s seven-person support team also has deep local connections. Four of them have between 15 and 19 years at the bank: Kathy Stevens, senior credit analyst; Barb Weymouth, regional loan production assistant supervisor; and Liz Harrison and Shelly Knapp, both loan production assistants. Other support staff are Mitchell Grant, Tej Chauhan and Heath Treichel, all credit analysts.

What’s all that time in market mean?

“We’re very dedicated to each of these communities,” Swanson said. “We spend a lot of countless hours volunteering our time. Matt and I do a lot of coaching and youth sports, and the others are very involved in serving on boards, whether it’s rotary, for church or other nonprofits out there. So, we’re dedicated to preserving that safety net within our communities but also very dedicated to doing projects that maintain the employment figures here or just promote the economic growth within each of these communities.”

Everyone cherishes the area, he said.

“It is very unique and there are so many different industries and types of customers that we have to be jack-of-all-trades to make sure we preserve that economic stability here,” Swanson said of the team.

Commercial business as diverse as the scenery

The Skagit/Island commercial team works with clients in industries that include farming, fishing, manufacturing, retail and restaurant and professional services. Skagit Valley is renowned for its tulip farms that blossom in spectacular color each spring, drawing tens of thousands of visitors to the region.

One of the office’s clients is a large bulb farmer. The bank also has financed vessels for clients out of Anacortes who fish the waters off Alaska. The team also works with a number of regional manufacturers and does a lot of commercial and industrial lending, Swanson said.

The team’s largest deals tend to be owner-occupied commercial real estate for local businesses.

Among the Skagit/Island team’s 2024 loans, Lehman led a deal to help a mainstay Mexican restaurant finance the purchase of its building after many years leasing. The project will utilize the Small Business Administration’s 504 program.

Wise led financing for the acquisition of the business and real estate for a local craft distillery on Whidbey Island using a combination of SBA 504 and SBA 7(a) loan products to complete the package. Austin Patjens, a Heritage SBA business development officer in Tacoma, and Rob Mellish, branch banking area manager for Island County, also assisted in the deal.

Hanstad secured a $5 million guidance line of credit for a contractor for equipment purchases. And in December, he finalized a Washington State Small Business Credit Initiative (SSBCI) loan to purchase an office building with improvements for a local medical practice. SSBCI provides capital to small businesses and nonprofits primarily in underserved and underbanked communities.

Swanson completed a deal for a ground-up construction project for a local landscaping company that utilized financing through the Heritage Bank Community Development Entity, or HBCDE, loan program, which finances businesses in economically distressed areas with better rates, terms and more flexibility

Hanstad and Swanson assisted the bank’s Yakima commercial team with a municipal bond that will fund a solar project for a local school district. Municipal lending is one of the team’s niches. The group supports all the municipal lending bankwide, including in Oregon and Idaho, and helps facilitate underwriting, Swanson said.

“That’s been kind of my main area of expertise for the bank over the years,” he said. “We haven’t done a high volume of it in the past few years, but over the past 10 years we’ve done quite a bit of that.”

Broad community buy-in

Swanson enjoys his team and the members’ stability, knowledge and willingness to help the communities they serve.

Lehman, for example, has coached baseball, basketball and football and is the booster club president for Burlington-Edison High School’s football program. He’s been involved in the Burlington Mid-Day Rotary, Skagit Community Foundation and Skagit Valley Hospital Foundation over the years.

Hanstad has served as a board member of the Economic Development Board of Stanwood, Stanwood-Camano Kiwanis Club, Conway School District, Community Action of Skagit County, Children of the Valley and Bethany Covenant Church.

Wise serves on the boards of the WhidbeyHealth Foundation and Oak Harbor Main Street Association as well as the finance committees of the Whidbey Community Foundation and Island County Historical Society.

Oicles has been heavily involved in Rotary Club of Anacortes since 2009 and previously served on the Island Health Foundation board.

Swanson has coached basketball and baseball in local AAU and Skagit County Parks and Recreation programs and has been treasurer for the Mount Vernon Public Schools Foundation for the past eight years.

Responding to his team’s widespread community involvement, Swanson said, “It’s a community bank, so we need to live it firsthand, just helping the communities, whether it’s volunteering or just financing the projects that help it economically.”