The leader of the Cache Valley Bank said Thursday that it is solid financially, and deficiencies spelled out in a regulatory cease-and-desist order focus on items the bank believed already had been addressed.

The Federal Reserve Board last week issued a consent cease-and-desist order against the Cache Valley Banking Co. and subsidiary Cache Valley Bank, which has locations in Logan and North Logan. The Utah Department of Financial Institutions issued a similar order. Both terminated previous agreements among the parties calling for certain changes relating to the bank's "safety and soundness."

The Federal Reserve Board's most recent order said the bank had worked to comply with a 2004 agreement but had not yet fully complied with all of its provisions. After that agreement was signed, the board and state department found additional deficiencies at the bank.

The latest order spells out various requirements for reporting on oversight of the management and operation of the bank; better documentation of the deliberations and actions of the board of directors and its committees; the development of an "enhanced" written code of ethics and conflicts of interest policy that applies to all the companies' directors, officers and employees; and the revision of loan policies and procedures, including those involving construction and agricultural loans.

J. Gregg Miller, president and chief executive officer of the bank, said Thursday that the bank had believed it was complying with the previous agreements and had been working to implement what the regulators had asked.

"There have been issues over items that needed to improve," he said. "There may have been a few items here and there that were new to us (in the most recent order), but for the most part we've done exactly what they've requested of us."

He acknowledged that the bank did have some problems with some agricultural loans but opted to remove them from the balance sheet. "We've charged those off and moved those behind us," he said.

"The bank is extremely financially safe as it exists right now. We have an excellent capital position. Historically we have been profitable. We did move profits year-end over into our reserve account and charged off a number of loans that had been an issue with regulators. We gave up the fight on those. ...

"We're a small, hometown bank. We grew rapidly. In fairness, we probably didn't put the controls or systems in place, but we didn't lose money because of that. We have never had anything that has gotten away from us internally."

A spokeswoman for the Federal Reserve Bank in San Francisco said she could not comment about the matter. Tom Bay, supervisor of banks for the Utah Department of Financial Institutions, likewise declined to discuss specifics or the background of the matter.