Coastal Heritage Bank launches Joseph C. Hayes Community Banker award

Coastal Heritage Bank has created an annual Joseph C. Hayes Community Banker of the Year Award to honor employees who reflect the longtime leader’s focus on integrity, service and relationship-based banking. The inaugural recipients were announced in May 2026, with the bank also presenting Hayes a separate commemorative award for his career contributions.

Why it matters: - The new award formalizes the values Coastal Heritage Bank wants to reward across its workforce: leadership, humility, service and community impact. - The recognition also ties the bank’s future culture to Joseph C. Hayes, one of its most prominent longtime leaders. - The award is meant to reinforce relationship-based community banking inside the organization and across the communities it serves.

What happened: - Coastal Heritage Bank established the Joseph C. Hayes Community Banker of the Year Award, an annual honor introduced in May 2026. - The bank announced the inaugural recipients on July 1, 2026. - The first honorees are Steve Amico, Brian Madden, Susan Rose and Maria Vafiades. - Brian Madden was recognized posthumously. - Coastal Heritage Bank also presented Hayes with a commemorative award honoring his leadership and service.

The details: - The award recognizes employees who show strong core values, lead by example, serve their communities, demonstrate humility and build meaningful relationships. - The honor is designed to celebrate impact both in the communities the bank serves and among colleagues across the organization. - Hayes joined Scituate Federal Savings Bank in 1976 as a conveyancing attorney. - Hayes later served as President, Chairman, Chairman of Coastal Heritage Bank and Chairman Emeritus. - Hayes helped guide the institution through decades of growth while keeping a focus on community banking. - Coastal Heritage Bank is a mutually owned, multi-service financial institution. - The bank operates full-service offices in Weymouth, East Weymouth, South Weymouth, Marshfield, Scituate, Hanover, Quincy, Green Harbor and Kingston. - Coastal Heritage Bank is a Member FDIC, Member DIF and Equal Housing Lender. - More information is available on the bank’s website. - Coastal Heritage Bank also shared updates on LinkedIn and Facebook.

Between the lines: - The award gives Coastal Heritage Bank a formal way to define and preserve the leadership style Hayes represented. - Naming the honor after a longtime insider signals continuity, not a break, in the bank’s culture. - Recognizing a special inaugural class suggests the bank wanted the first year to reflect a broader set of examples, not just a single winner.

What's next: - Coastal Heritage Bank plans to present the award annually going forward. - Future recipients will be measured against the standard set by the first honorees and by Hayes’s career-long example. - The bank is positioning the award as an ongoing internal marker of community banking excellence.