D.L. Evans breaks ground on Ammon branch

Officers of D.L. Evans Bank, developers and local government and business leaders did a ceremonial groundbreaking in Ammon Wednesday.

Founded in Albion in 1904 with $25,000, D.L. Evans Bank is looking to expand in eastern Idaho. Officers broke ground Wednesday on a new branch in Ammon, indicating they had plans for more offices in Idaho Falls, Blackfoot and Rexburg.

The new branch, the company's 21st, is expected to be finished by Thanksgiving, said Byron Wiscombe, who will manage it when it opens. It will be on the Sunnyside Road side of the 90-acre Sand Creek Commons development, which will also be home to Cabela's.

Wednesday's groundbreaking is likely be the first of many in the next year or two, said Eric Isom, chief development officer of Ball Ventures, which is developing Sand Creek Commons with the Salt Lake-based Woodbury Corp. Eventually, they anticipate developing 300,000 square feet of retail, restaurant and service space.

"We expect more announcements in the next several months," Isom said.

D.L. Evans, which built a branch at 17th Street and Jennie Lee Drive in 2007, has had a sign for years on Pancheri Drive, near Snake River Landing.

Wiscombe said when he asked the bank's officers, "What about Ammon?" they told him, "You tell us. You live there." So an Ammon branch leapfrogged ahead of the Pancheri project.

The bank's CEO, John V. Evans Jr., was on hand for the ceremony, but his father, former Idaho Gov. John V. Evans Sr., now 89, was unable to make it. The elder Evans, grandson of D.L. Evans, remains the institution's president.

Other guests included Gavin Gee, director of the Idaho Department of Finance ("It's not every day a bank invites its regulator to a groundbreaking," he said) and Ammon Mayor Dana Kirkham.