Business View Magazine | October 2020

79 BUSINESS VIEW MAGAZINE OCTOBER 2020 F I RST HER I TAGE FEDERAL CREDI T UNION protect our frontline staff who handled member transactions. We created A and B teams, where the A Team worked one week, while the B Team was out, and then, we brought the B Team in and the A Team took the next week off. We were trying to do our best to protect our employees, knowing that there was a lot of stress on those who were still meeting with customers during an uneasy time. We wanted to give them a chance to refresh their engines for a week. We were very pleased that we made that decision. And I think the staff was very appreciative of that, as well.” “We took this pandemic seriously,” Pisano continues. “Our crisis management team started meeting well in advance. In fact, we started meeting more regularly once we understood a first case was recognized in the State of Washington. We turned up the heat on our daily meetings, and we were meeting on weekends to make hard decisions. We closed locations when we thought there was a compromise with a COVID situation. In most cases, it was out of an abundance of caution – protecting our staff and our community. And we’ll make those types of decisions, going forward if we have to, as well. We brought some staff back, and we have a plan in place to start moving the rest back over a four-to-six-month period. But, that said, we’re monitoring the pandemic situation here in our local area, daily. And if we feel that we should pull back, we will.” Some recent good news for the greater First Heritage community was the recent opening of the credit union’s newest branch in Corning, NY. “It’s a little more than just a branch,” Pisano notes. “It’s really a new corporate headquarters and a major investment for our membership, our staff, and our community. It’s a 27,500-sq.- ft. complex; the first floor is a retail branch, and the second and third floors are back-office departments that support our ten branch locations. The branch, itself, is a little different than you normally see in this area. It’s more modern looking, it has an open hall, and it