Nordskog Leaves as Chairman of Savings & Loan; Director Quits

Robert A. Nordskog, the chairman of Investment Savings & Loan in Woodland Hills and a director since the thrift was formed 10 years ago, has resigned both posts. Another of the S&L;’s original directors, Gail C. Potter, also quit.

Potter said he and Nordskog resigned because their other business interests were taking up too much of their time and not because of any management dissension or major problems at Investment Savings, which has been struggling financially.

“I was just plain ready to slow down,” Potter, the 65-year-old owner of D&G; Escrow Corp. in Encino, said in a telephone interview. “It’s time I started cutting back on some of this stuff.”

Nordskog, 74, and Richard G. Voll, Investment Savings’ president and chief executive, did not return calls requesting comment. The resignations occurred in January, but were announced publicly by Investment Savings only last week.

Potter, however, said Nordskog’s departure reflected “basically the same” reasoning as his own decision to leave. “He’s so involved in so many different things,” Potter said.

One of Investment Savings’ remaining six directors, Sherman Oaks attorney Richard U. Harker, said Nordskog found it “became increasingly hard to do his duties as chairman of the board. I think he was getting pretty tired of the whole problem.”

Nordskog, who has set numerous speedboat records, is head of Nordskog Industries in Van Nuys, a $30-million company that principally makes aircraft galleys.

Harker said no one has yet been named to replace Nordskog and Potter on the board.

One of Big 3

Investment Savings, which had $273.2 million in assets as of Sept. 30, is the third-biggest S&L; headquartered in the San Fernando Valley. Valley Federal Savings & Loan is the area leader, with $3.3 billion in assets, followed by Republic Federal Savings & Loan, a unit of Weyerhaeuser Co., with $1.4 billion in assets.

Because Investment Savings is closely held--it has only about 435 stockholders--it is not required to publicly disclose its quarterly financial results, although it often does so as a matter of public relations.

In the six months ended Sept. 30, it said it lost $429,000, compared to a profit of $254,000 a year earlier. But it’s not known whether Investment Savings’ performance has improved since then because it did not release its results for its fiscal third quarter and nine months ended Dec. 31. Its fiscal year ends Thursday.

Potter, however, said Investment Savings is “an excellently run” company. “Like every other savings and loan in the business, certainly there are problems. But Investment has no more or no worse than everybody else,” he said.

During most of Nordskog’s reign as chairman, the main operating executive at Investment Savings was Ted C. Hill, who resigned in late 1986 to run a supermarket in central California.

Under their guidance, the S&L; grew rapidly in its early years, partly because of an aggressive effort to arrange commercial real-estate loans. Its assets soared from $5.4 million in early 1979 to more than $320 million six years later.

But its profit was much less steady, even though Investment Savings later scaled back its commercial lending and focused more on residential mortgage loans.

Over the last four years, the thrift has never matched the $2.08 million it earned in fiscal 1983, even though its assets doubled during that period. In fiscal 1987, Investment Savings lost $995,830, meaning that it lost $1.42 million in the 18 months ended Sept. 30.