The out-of-service Downieville ATM on Wednesday, February 7th

DOWNIEVILLE — If you have been looking for cash in Western Sierra County in the past two weeks, you know that it has become as scarce a commodity as a gold nugget. For more than sixteen days now, the Wells Fargo ATM in Downieville has been out of commission. Despite numerous calls from various folks, we still don’t have a functioning ATM or timeline for its repair.

For three days in a row last week, a hardware technician from NCR Corporation in Reno showed up to open the ATM for a software specialist to fix it, and for three straight days, he sat on a bench waiting for a person who never showed up. The only contact number Wells Fargo provided him was the 1-800 number on the front of the ATM. Some residents have pointed out that Wells Fargo could have carted up a new ATM by wagon and horse train by now. Locals are grateful to have the Wells Fargo ATM, being the only one in Downieville (and the reason why many of us are even Wells Fargo customers), but many have become dependent on this one source.

After reaching out for comment, Tyler Hersko, Assistant Vice President for Regional Communications for Northern California at Wells Fargo, has been helping to track down answers. Although the path to resolution is not yet clear, Wells Fargo issued a statement saying, “We apologize for the inconvenience and are working with multiple vendors with the utmost urgency to address repairs tied to a power surge so the community has access to the ATM again. We expect resolution in the coming days.”

Bill Kinzie’s get-well card

I guess, for now, all we can do is pray for our ATM to heal itself. Concerned citizen Bill Kinzie started a get-well card for our ATM, so if you see him, be sure to sign it!