ANNOUNCEMENTS.

Banks

First Northwest Bank of Arlington Heights, Ill., named S. Michael Polanski president and chief executive officer. Polanski replaces John Corneliuson, who retired.

Jim Turner, previously senior financial specialist at First Union, has been named vice president for the KeysRegion Community Bank, based in Key Largo, Fla.. He will be in charge of business development, specializing in loans and investments.

Peter Cullen has been named corporate privacy officer for Royal Bank of Canada, in Toronto. Cullen is responsible for administering the bank's privacy code.

Paul Rodeno has been promoted to chief administrative officer of Eldorado Bank in Laguna Hills, Calif Rodeno, who has been with the bank since 1986, previously was a commercial lender for First Interstate Bank.

Great American Federal, a Pittsburgh-based savings and loan institution, has named Jeff Walker vice president and director of marketing. Vicki Hays has been named vice president for the credit services division.

Nicholas G. Hahn is the new executive vice president and chief financial officer at Hudson United Bancorp of Mahwah, N.J. Previously, Hahn was senior vice president and controller at CoBank, ACB, in Denver.

Citizens Business Bank of Ontario, Calif., named several new appointments. Douglas B. Tipping was named vice president and banking officer of the firm's Saddleback (Orange County) office. Michael B. Wholley was appointed vice president and manager of the real estate department Karen Jennings was appointed vice president and banking office at the Plaza office, also in Orange County.

David J. Fairchild has been named executive vice president, commercial banking and chief credit officer for First Market Bank in Richmond, Va. He was previously senior vice president and manager for corporate banking in central Virginia at Wachovia Bank.

D. Scott Clarke is the new vice president and director of secondary marketing at Cresleigh Bancorp in Indianapolis.

South Shore Bank of Chicago has named Anne Arvia executive vice president and chief operating officer.

Thomas J. Schwartz was appointed group president, commercial banking, and Janet M. Viano is group president, retail banking, at First Midwest Bank, Itasca, Ill.

Financial Services

Eugene M. Natali has been appointed chief executive officer at C.S. McKee, a Pittsburgh institutional investment management firm, succeeding James H. Hanes, who continues as chairman. Natali joined the firm in 1998 as senior vice president and director of marketing.

Steven E. Benson was named vice president of sales for Universal Pensions Inc., Brainerd, Minn. He was formerly had of institutional sales for ICMA Retirement Corp. Michael Book, who was previously a senior consultant to Mutual of America, has been named major account executive.

Rebecca Luckey has been named regional vice president, financial institutions division, for IFS Financial Services. She has responsibility for Western-Southern Enterprise annuity and mutual fund products in Alabama, Louisiana, Mississippi, Tennessee and the Florida panhandle. IFS is a wholly owned subsidiary of Western-Southern Life Assurance Co.

Mergers and Acquisitions

Minneapolis-based U.S. Bancorp has acquired Scripps Financial Corp. of San Diego, parent company of Scripps Bank U.S. Bancorp, with about 1,000 banking offices in the West and Midwest, is the nation's ninth largest financial services holding company with assets of $86 billion.

North Valley Bancorp, Redding, Calif., has acquired Six Rivers National Bank, increasing North Valley's position in a five-county area of northern California and southern Oregon. The combined banks will have assets of about $536 million.

First National Bank of Nevada Holding Co. will acquire Rocky Mountain Bank for $9.75 per share. First National currently owns two institutions: First Bank of Arizona and First National Bank of Nevada. Rocky Mountain operates nine offices, including seven Wal-Mart in-store operations, several of which are in the Phoenix metropolitan area.

The Federal Reserve has approved Wells Fargo & Co.'s $3.2 billion purchase of First Security Corp. The combined institution, with assets of $241 billion, will have operations in 23 states. In four states--Utah, Nevada, Idaho and New Mexico--it will be the largest.

Cole Taylor Bank of Chicago has acquired the Corus trust and asset management business from Corns Bank, also of Chicago. Cole Taylor is the area's largest independent bank, with assets of $2.2 billion.

Alabama National BanCorporation of Birmingham, Ala., plans to acquire Peoples State Bank of Groveland, Fla. Peoples State Bank will become a wholly owned subsidiary but will continue to operate under its own name. Alabama National Bancorporation, with $2.1 billion in assets operates 10 bank subsidiaries in 47 locations in Alabama, Florida and Georgia. The Peoples State Bank acquisition will increase company assets by $120 million to a total of about $400 million in the state of Florida.

Chemical Financial Corp. of Midland, Mich., plans to consolidate nine existing subsidiaries into two. The new Midland bank group, to be known as Chemical Bank & Trust Co., will consist of Chemical Bank & Trust Co., Chemical Bank Bay Area, Chemical Bank Michigan, Chemical Bank Thumb Area and Chemical Bank Key State. The Cadillac group, Chemical Bank West, will consist of Chemical Bank West, Chemical Bank Montcalm, Chemical Bank Central and Chemical Bank North. A tenth subsidiary, Chemical Bank South in Marshall, Mich., is not part of the consolidation at present. Chemical's multibank holdings have assets of about $1.9 billion.

United Financial of St. Petersburg, Fla., has agreed to buy all the stock of First Security Bank of Sarasota. Combined assets will total $247 million.

Service Providers

Trudy Maus has been named creative director for BannerDirect, a direct marketing agency, in its Wilmington, N.C. office. She retains her previous duties as production director.

Timothy J. Crabb has been named channel marketing manager of the financial services group, at Experian, an international database-marketing firm with headquarters in Nottingham, U.K. and Orange, Calif. Prior to joining Experian, Crabb held marketing positions at several financial services companies.

Julie Eagleton has been appointed account supervisor at Media Logic, a full-service advertising agency in Albany, N.Y. Previously, she was director of strategic services for Richard A. Peters & Associates, Inc. in Rochester, N.Y.

Joy C. Kopp was named director of client services for Imaginet, LLC, a Minneapolis consulting firm specializing in e-commerce matters.

Nicholas Logan has been named president and chief executive officer of ePicNetz inc., a provider of Internet content and connectivity to retail purveyors. Logan reports to George R. Wallner, president and CEO of Hypercom Corp., of which ePicNetz is a wholly owned subsidiary.

Scott A. Zust has been named president of the Document solutions division of The BISYS Group Inc., Little Falls, N.J., which provides information processing and check imaging services to financial institutions.

Glenn Weiner, formerly vice president for smart card technologies at American Express, has joined ComSense as senior vice president of corporate strategy. Weiner had been instrumental in the implementation of the American Express "Blue" smart card.

Agreements and Alliances

Access CoverageCorp Inc. of Charlotte, N.C., has joined with Community Bank Marketing Inc. of Atlanta to produce private-label insurance products and services for community financial institutions.

Tecniflex Inc., Nashville, Tenn., has entered into a partnership with Wincor Nixdorf of Austin, Tex. Wincor is the world's third-largest supplier of automated teller machines, and Tecniflex is the company's largest dealer to financial institutions with less than $10 billion in assets.