Springs Valley Bank earns Indiana Bankers Association Five Star honor

Springs Valley Bank & Trust Company’s Five Star Member honor is more than a plaque on a wall in Jasper. It signals that one of Dubois County’s most visible financial institutions stayed active in the Indiana Bankers Association’s political awareness, issues advocacy, lifelong learning, volunteerism and preferred service provider network during the most recently completed calendar year.

Indiana Bankers Association President and CEO Amber Van Til presented the award Thursday, April 9, recognizing Springs Valley’s involvement throughout 2025. The designation goes to member banks that demonstrate strong commitment in those five areas, making it a measure of industry engagement as much as it is a mark of performance. Springs Valley also received the same recognition in April 2025 for its work throughout 2024, a repeat honor that points to sustained participation rather than a one-time campaign.

For Jasper and the wider county, that matters because Springs Valley is not a distant regional name. The bank says it has served the community for more than 120 years and lists banking centers in French Lick, Jasper, Washington, Princeton and Paoli. Its history page traces the institution back to 1959, when banks merged to form Springs Valley National Bank with assets of $5,250,745.73. In 1971, Harriett Brown of Springs Valley National Bank became one of the first female bank presidents in Indiana, and in 1985, after cross-county branching was allowed, the Jasper office opened in a mobile unit.

That Jasper presence is part of the bank’s day-to-day economic role in Dubois County, where access to local lending, deposit services and business banking can shape which firms expand, hire and stay rooted. Springs Valley’s footprint extends across Dubois, Daviess, Gibson and Orange counties, and its current ownership structure, through SVB&T Corporation, reflects a local institution that still operates with a regional reach. The bank’s 2026 move to name Haley Bertram assistant banking center manager of its Dubois County banking centers adds another sign that it continues investing in local leadership.

Van Til, who joined the Indiana Bankers Association in 2002 and became president and CEO in 2017, handed Springs Valley a recognition that says as much about business credibility as civic visibility. In Dubois County, where manufacturing, retail and service firms depend on dependable credit relationships, banks like Springs Valley remain part of the county’s economic backbone, not just its community calendar.