50 Employees to Lose Jobs in Bank Takeover : Thousand Oaks: By April 8, four of the five locations will close, with accounts moved to nearby First Interstate branches.

Four of five First State Bank of the Oaks branches will close and about 50 employees will be out of work by April 8 as First Interstate Bank of California finalizes its takeover of the Thousand Oaks-based bank, First Interstate officials said Wednesday.

The branches that will close--in Westlake Village, Thousand Oaks, Simi Valley and Camarillo--are within 1 1/2 miles of a First Interstate branch, said Rich Wyler, a bank spokesman.

The one branch that will remain open, at 753 N. Wendy Drive in Newbury Park, will be converted to a First Interstate branch April 8, he said.

The other branch buildings are leased from various owners, and First Interstate will continue paying rent until the leases expire, Wyler said.

The closures are part of an ongoing consolidation in the area’s banking business. Earlier this week, Great Western Bank announced that it would close four Ventura County branches of HomeFed Bank, which Great Western acquired from the federal government last month.

Under its takeover deal announced in August, First Interstate agreed to pay $23 million to acquire Bank of the Oaks, Wyler said. The deal is expected to be finalized Wednesday. However, officials will wait nearly another three months before closing the four Bank of the Oaks branches, he said.

The four branches that are closing employ 85 people, 33 of whom will be offered jobs at other First Interstate branches in the county, Wyler said.

The other 52 employees face layoff April 8 but will have access to First Interstate’s internal job-placing network for six months and will be given the same job placement priority that other bank employees have over outsiders applying for bank jobs, officials said.

Officials said those facing layoffs will be given two to four weeks severance pay for each year they were with Bank of the Oaks, which opened in 1980.

First Interstate officials met with Bank of the Oaks employees Wednesday to discuss the branch closings, Wyler said. “There weren’t a lot of surprises because people were aware of the proximity of the branches,” he said.

As for Bank of the Oaks customers, First Interstate mailed them letters Wednesday explaining what First Interstate branch their account will transfer to, Wyler said. All Bank of the Oaks customers will receive new checks, a new ATM number and six months of free checking when their branches close or switch over to First Interstate on April 8, he said.

With $148 million in assets, Bank of the Oaks is the third largest independent bank in Ventura County. It reported a net profit of $737,000 in the first nine months of 1993.

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First Interstate, in contrast, counts $48.9 billion in assets and reported a net profit of $150 million in the first three quarters of last year. Before acquiring Bank of the Oaks, First Interstate had seven branches in Ventura County and, with recent acquisitions, has about 400 branches statewide.

First State Bank of the Oaks was started nearly 14 years ago by Fred Raio, who left his job as a regional manager for First Interstate to open a bank in the Conejo Valley.

“I thought it would be a good local business,” Raio said.

Raio said the small bank’s shareholders finally agreed to sell it to First Interstate when the massive, statewide bank made them an offer too good to refuse.

“We had a very successful bank, but it seemed in the best financial interest of all involved,” he said.

Raio, 60, said he does not plan to remain with First Interstate after April 8, and may retire or move on to another job.