JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon joined Mayor Brandon Scott, Gov.-elect Wes Moore and other political and local leaders at Mondawmin Mall on Wednesday to celebrate the recent opening of Chase’s new community-centered branch at the mall.

With a community-inspired model, the branch aims to help minority, women and veteran residents in surrounding areas by offering “specialty financial health workshops,” where residents can learn about budgeting, credit, homeownership and other topics.

It also has plans to support local entrepreneurs seeking to grow their small businesses.

“Here in Baltimore, we are in the business of changing lives and revitalizing our communities in a way that acknowledges … their history and intentionally invests in their future,” Scott said.

“We do do it out of necessity. If we don’t all take a moment of time to lift up all of our society … we will all be worse off for that,” Dimon added.

The West Baltimore branch is the 14th community-centered branch that Chase has opened since 2019, and the first in Baltimore. The bank has plans to open more across the country as part of a $30 billion commitment announced in 2020 to “advance economic growth and opportunity for Black, Hispanic and Latino communities,” according to its website.

West Baltimore has had the highest number of communities lacking local bank branches since the 1960s, the Baltimore Banner reported in August. A Banner analysis of data from the FDIC and the Census Bureau found that while 89% of city residents have a bank nearby, in West Baltimore that drops to only 54%.

In unbanked areas, the Banner reported, median income is $21,000 lower than in banked areas, and median home values are lower, as well. In those areas, the proportion of Black residents is also 25% higher, The Banner found. The numbers, The Banner reported, highlight the barriers and underinvestment certain communities have faced for decades.

Leaders said Wednesday that racial and wealth disparities in Baltimore and across the country make the approach of Chase’s community centers like that in Mondawmin so important.

“Anybody who has grown up Black in Baltimore has suffered because of that racial wealth divide,” Scott said. “That is why it is so critically important to give our residents access to quality and fair financial services to help them create and grow their wealth.”

The creation of economic opportunity, Moore said, is important.

“Every single community, every single group, every single place in our state needs to have pathways to work, wages and wealth,” Moore said. “The beauty of what we are seeing right here is that this place symbolizes all of them.”

Mondawmin Community Center branch manager LaToya Cooper, a West Baltimore native, said she didn’t learn about banking until she went to college.

“People can’t prosper when they don’t understand how their finances work, or when they feel like there’s no opportunity for them,” Cooper said. “This is just one piece in helping people realize that they do have opportunity. They do have an option to improve.”

She said it’s important to educate families on these topics, and to start early, so that they understand that “you can save, you can grow. You don’t have to be born rich, you can still work hard and achieve the same things as everybody else.”

The branch has hired two senior business consultants who will focus on offering coaching to Baltimore entrepreneurs on topics such as managing cash flow and effective marketing, the company said in a release.

Chase also announced Wednesday it will donate $600,000 to the Harbor Bank of Maryland Community Development Corporation, so that the bank can expand its ability to provide technical and financial help to small businesses.

The bank in January announced it was committing $20 million “towards economic equity and mobility in Baltimore City,” the mayor’s office said.

That’s important, because, “What small business people need is not just the money, it’s the advice,” Dimon said. “How to do a budget, how to negotiate a lease, where do you open your second store or your second restaurant, how do you negotiate with the government.”

In the branch, there is a space where community workshops or events. Customers, residents and nonprofits will also have access to free Wi-Fi at the branch, and all programming is open to Chase customers and non-customers alike, the company said.

Dimon said it’s important for the community “to feel comfortable to come here as they are. Come with your dog, come with your kids, and learn a little bit about money and mortgages and the things you need.”

Staff members will also host workshops outside of the branch, within the community, said Mondawmin Community Center Community Manager Joel Gamble, who was also raised in West Baltimore.

Other members of the staff are also from the area, Dimon said.

That was especially important to Cooper.

“I needed people that our neighbors in the community could relate to, and that was the most important thing,” she said. “In order for us to deepen relationships and strengthen relationships, financial or otherwise, our community needed to be able to relate to the people that are here to serve them.”

cadence.quaranta@thebaltimorebanner.com