by Mike Sharkey
Staff Writer
When the Charles E. Bennett Federal Building was reopened after an 18-month, $25 million facelift, many of the government entities in the building were just happy to get back to their offices, minus the lead paint and asbestos.
Jax Federal Credit Union also moved back into the 42-year-old building, but upgraded the branch to match the building’s upgrades. Today, the branch on the garage floor of the West Bay Street building may be the most modern and safest bank branch in town.
“We were the first ones in town to have a cash recycler,” said Angie Coleman-Rao, the vice president of marketing for Jax Federal. “After the renovations, we moved into our two-room branch and there was no room for a traditional cash vault.”
The cash recycler is made by De La Rue, a British-based company that’s the world’s largest security printer and paper maker with offices in 31 countries. The machine allows the branch to remain till free while still being able to accommodate its customers.
The machine can hold close to half a million dollars in cash but there’s never that much in it. It lets customers deposit cash or checks, is completely burglary and fraud proof and allows credit union employees to dispense cash back to customers in any denomination they choose.
The bank also has a change machine that’s free for customers and costs seven percent for non-credit union customers. It allows customers to exchange coins for cash.
What makes the branch so safe is its location. Anyone entering the Bennett Building has to show identification and pass through a metal detector that is supervised by armed guards. If you can’t get in with a camera, you certainly aren’t going to get in with a weapon. The branch is also located one floor below the main entrance on Bay Street and the hallway leading to the branch can be seen by another station of armed security guards.
“It’s very safe. No one is getting in,” said Kim Watson, financial service officer, who transferred from the Southside branch. “That’s kind of the reason I transferred here.”
Jax Federal has five full-service branches in Jacksonville (the other downtown branch is in Independent Square and its headquarters is on Park Street in the Brooklyn section of downtown,) several other restricted-service branches and 30,000 members. Started in 1935, the credit union originally was established for federal government employees only. In August 1982, the National Credit Union Association allowed Jax Federal to expand its field of membership. Today, the credit union offers membership to all federal employees as well as those of 300 of what it calls Select Employee Groups.
The newly-renovated building has been open for several months, but the credit union just began serving customers again a few weeks ago.
“We had our grand opening two weeks ago, but we opened in early April” said Coleman-Rao. “We had an ATM on site and we were doing loans. We did not have any cash available until a couple of weeks ago.”