WATERLOO - Jim Gerber and Wade Itzen worked for years at rival landmark downtown banks on opposite sides of the Cedar River.

Gerber worked at the Waterloo Savings Bank on the west side of the river; Itzen at The National Bank of Waterloo on the east side.

Now, both those banks are gone following a series of mergers and acquisitions. But Gerber and Itzen are still here - now both at the same bank, BankIowa.

In fact, they've worked together so well that Gerber, with nearly 40 years in the banking business, is relinquishing some of his job responsibilities to Itzen. He has succeeded Gerber as the local Black Hawk County market president.

"I'm cutting way back. I've been wearing several hats recently," Gerber said. In addition to local market president, he was serving as acting market president at BankIowa's Cedar Rapids offices for about the past two years, spending about two days a week there. In addition, he's been the entire organization's chief lending officer.

"Basically I'm going to cut back to just be chief lending officer, and sort of a consultant or adviser" locally, Gerber said. "And of course I'll still be a director" of the bank. A new market president, Greg Neumeyer, also has been named for Cedar Rapids.

A native of Cedar Rapids, Gerber has been in banking since the last 1960s when he was recruited at Coe College to serve a stint with the Federal Reserve in Chicago.

"That was where it all started. It was a great training ground," Gerber said. He chose to join Waterloo Savings bank in 1973.

"I liked the community banking atmosphere. I liked (WSB executives) Dale (DeKoster) and Jim O'Connor, the way they ran the bank. It was just a good opportunity. I was familiar with the bank because we had examined Waterloo Savings Bank."

In fact, Gerber was hired at WSB after surveying the feasibility of the bank opening a branch office on Cedar Heights Drive in Cedar Falls. "The Fed sent me out to do the feasibility study and I ended up getting the job," with WSB, he said.

That also was same year that WSB moved from the Waterloo Building near West Fourth and Commercial streets to a new building at West Park Avenue and the Cedar River, the present location of successor institution US Bank. Three years later the National Bank of Waterloo completed a new downtown main bank at 100 E. Park Ave. That was where Itzen later began his local banking career.

A native of Herman, Minn., Itzen joined NBW in 1992, when he was appointed assistant vice president of commercial lending. He holds a bachelor's degree from North Dakota State University, a master's degree from Morehead State University in Minnesota, and an MBA from the University of Minnesota. Before joining NBW, he was vice president of agricultural and commercial lending at Norwest Bank in Fargo, N.D. and he worked in the farm credit system during the 1980s farm crisis.

"It made me a better banker going through some of those lean times," Itzen said. "Growing up on a farm, it helped me appreciate both sides of the fence."

Beginning in the early 1990s, Itzen and Gerber each worked for a succession of banks, each while remaining in the same building, through a succession of name changes and acquisitions. Gerber's WSB became Mercantile Bank, Firstar, and finally US Bank. Itzen's NBW was Homeland, Magna, Union Planters and finally Regions Bank.

Each banker made one more change - to BankIowa, the former Farmers Bank, based in Independence, which entered the Waterloo-Cedar Falls market in 1997. Gerber, who had become local Firstar president in 1998, joined BankIowa in 2002 in its top local spot as the Kimball location. Itzen, who had assumed many administrative responsibilities at Regions following administrative cutbacks there, joined BankIowa in 2005 as senior vice president for commercial banking, a position he will continue to hold along with assuming Gerber's market president duties.

"Knowing Jim was here, and knowing Jim as a person, as a competitor from the old Waterloo Savings Bank-National Bank of Waterloo days, I knew he was a great banker and one I could learn things from. I enjoy working with him. I wanted to get back to the smaller bank atmosphere," Itzen said.

It's been a smooth transition, as Itzen took on some of Gerber's tasks here when he was busy in Cedar Rapids. They said the public should notice little change in day-to-day banking operations now that it is official.

Contact Pat Kinney at (319) 291-1484 or Pat.Kinney@wcfcourier.com.

{M3In other BankIowa personnel moves of local interest:

- University of Northern Iowa graduate Terry Toale has been named BankIowa's chief operating officer. He has been with BankIowa since 1995.

- Shelli Pint has been named office manager of BankIowa's Kimball Avenue location. She have been in banking 19 years and has worked for BankIowa since 1999.

- Jane Messingham has been named office manager of the bank's downtown Waterloo branch.