BANKING : California State Adds 3 Local Branches, Hires Veteran Executive

Orange County, still struggling to join the economic recovery, remains a fertile area for bankers elsewhere.

The latest financial institution to enter the county is California State Bank in Covina, which picked up three branches with two recent deals. The bank also hired veteran Orange County banker David T. Blankenhorn as its executive vice president in charge of bank administration.

“The bank is focusing its growth plans in Orange County, and plans to expand its operations there either internally or through acquisitions,” Blankenhorn said. The bank is set to open a new branch, possibly taking over the former headquarters of failed Bank of Newport on Coast Highway in Newport Beach.

The building should be familiar to Blankenhorn. He was brought in last spring to try to save the troubled Bank of Newport. Instead, he helped to uncover a major fraud by a borrower that led to the bank’s failure in August.

California State Bank picked up branches near John Wayne Airport in Newport Beach and in Orange when it bought the deposits of CommerceBank, a Newport Beach bank that also failed in August.

Last month, the Covina institution completed the $8.1-million purchase of healthy Bank of Anaheim and now has a total of $480 million in loans and other assets. California State Bank has 14 branches altogether, including nine in Los Angeles County and one each in Riverside and San Bernardino counties.