Longtime Riverview Bancorp CEO stepping down

Riverview Community Bank’s longtime leader Pat Sheaffer is stepping down, the Vancouver-based institution announced Friday. An executive who orchestrated a successful Oregon expansion will succeed him on April 2.

Sheaffer has worked at Riverview since 1963, when the company had seven employees. Riverview now has more than 250 employees. Its assets in that time frame have grown from $6.5 million to $1.1 billion.

“Throughout my career, I have been fortunate enough to work with an outstanding group of banking professionals, and I am extremely proud of what we have accomplished together,” he said in a statement.

Sheaffer was named Riverview’s top executive in 1976 and steered the company through multiple economic expansions and recessions. He led its bid to go public in 1997. He will remain chairman of Riverview’s two boards, which govern the bank and the corporate holding company Riverview Bancorp Inc.

Filling the CEO’s role will be Kevin Lycklama, 40, who spearheaded the company’s acquisition of Gresham, Ore.-based MBank in September 2016. The move expanded Riverview’s Oregon footprint and doubled quarterly profits.

Shares of Riverview Bancorp, Inc., traded on the Nasdaq Exchange as RVSB, have climbed 65 percent since the acquisition. Trading closed at $8.90 per share Friday, up 7 cents.

Lycklama said he felt good about the promotion. He is entering his 12th year with the company and has been an executive for nearly a decade.

Lycklama said the company expects to continue to build on its presence in Oregon. He said the company will also stay focused on community banking in Clark County.

“As a community bank we kind of ebb and flow with the local economy — when it’s growing, the bank does well. When we tend to have recession and they struggle, we see our financial performance dip, too,” he said.