Troy-based Talmer Bancorp Inc., the holding company for Talmer Bank and Trust, will announce today that former Michigan Gov. Jennifer Granholm has joined its board of directors, effective immediately.
The move adds a high-profile name with national recognition for the bank as it prepares for an initial public offering, perhaps this year.
"We've attracted really top-quality board members as we try to become a powerhouse bank in the Midwest," said David Provost, chairman, president and CEO of Talmer Bank. "Jennifer is very, very smart. We like her background. Being governor of a state in hard times is a tough job."
Granholm was part of Ed McNamara's political machine in Wayne County in the 1990s and later was state attorney general before becoming the state's first female governor in 2003. She served two terms, then hosted "The War Room With Jennifer Granholm" on Current TV for more than a year. She quit in February when the network was sold to Al Jazeera, the global news network based in Qatar.
When it was suggested that having a nationally known Democrat on his board might help as he hopes to make inroads in Detroit -- a city dominated by the Democratic Party -- Provost said: "We have high-ranking Democrats, we have high-ranking Republicans. We have males and females. That's the diversity you're looking for in a board of directors. Building a top-quality board is an important part of the process of building a top-quality bank."
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