When you keep your money at a local, community bank like ours, you can rest assured that it’s being reinvested back into the communities in which you live, work, and play.
We love the Sioux Falls area.
We’ve called it home for the past 140 years, and we want to help it stay strong and thriving for our teammates, our customers, and our fellow neighbors.
That’s why we prioritize giving back through monetary donations and volunteering efforts.
To give you peace of mind that your money is supporting local communities and making a difference — rather than just sitting in some big-city bank account — we’d like to share some of the ways we lived up to our Stewardship value in 2024:
Avera Race Against Cancer
We are proud to join the annual Avera Race Against Cancer each year, bringing a team of participants to help support patients at the Avera Cancer Institute in Sioux Falls.
This year, our group consisted of 32 FNB teammates and 14 of their friends or family members. Out of the 46 team members, three were cancer survivors!
Bishop Dudley Hospitality House
In April, we presented a check for $75,000 to the Bishop Dudley Hospitality House in support of their Open Doors, Open Arms campaign.
The money will help support services for those in our community who are experiencing homelessness.
Additionally, between our retirees and our newest teammates, we assembled and delivered 100 hygiene packets for the Bishop Dudley Hospitality House this year.
Former FNB teammates assembling hygiene packets at our June retiree luncheon.
Blood Drives
We regularly host blood drives with the Community Blood Bank at our Downtown and Brandon branches. We also hosted a blood drive with the American Red Cross in August.
This year, nearly 100 units of blood were donated with the potential to help hundreds of local patients.
Children’s Home Society
Fourteen of our teammates volunteered their time and amazing wrapping skills at the Children’s Home Society Gift Wrap Booth in the Empire Mall, which raises funds for the local children’s home shelter.
Community Card Program
We donated nearly $35,000 to local schools through our Community Card program in 2024. Check the list below to see if your school earned money this year!
The Baltic School District received $3,729.40 this year, bringing their total to $38,151.
The Brandon Valley School District received $8,000 this year, bringing their total to $108,000.
The Colman-Egan School District received $968.91 this year, bringing their total to $4,952.80.
Dell Rapids Public Schools received $7,056.73 in 2024, bringing their total to $43,255.
Dell Rapids St. Mary Catholic Schools received $2,634 in 2024, bringing their total to $15,607.
The Flandreau School District received $5,177.45 in 2024, bringing their total to $57,108.97.
The Harrisburg School District received $7,100 this year, bringing their total to $42,601.40. Photo credit: Jon Klemme.
Feeding South Dakota
We held two volunteer outings at Feeding South Dakota in 2024.
For the first, 16 of our teammates packed 855 bags of food to feed families across South Dakota.
In July, nine of our summer interns and five full-time teammates packed an additional 1,127 bags of food.
Habitat for Humanity
Not only did we sponsor Habitat for Humanity’s annual Women Build event, but we also sent 16 of our hardworking teammates to help out for a day.
They worked with the Habitat team to replace windows in a rehab home that will house a deserving family in our community.
Hope Haven
At our first volunteer outing of the year, four teammates visited Hope Haven to cut materials and construct parts for wheelchairs. The Iowa-based organization assembles and distributes wheelchairs all across the world.
Junior Achievement
When they’re not visiting classrooms to help prepare young people for success, our Junior Achievement volunteers are organizing an ice cream social to raise money for the local organization.
This year marked our 12th annual ice cream social. Whether teammates bought an ice cream sundae or purchased a bingo card, all proceeds raised went to Junior Achievement.
Fun fact: For the 2023–2024 school year, 41 of our teammates served as Junior Achievement classroom volunteers!
Project Warm-Up
For the second year in a row, our teammates made fleece tie blankets to support Project Warm-Up, a local nonprofit that distributes blankets to children in need. This year, our teammates tied approximately 65 blankets.
Rake the Town
Active Generations’ Rake the Town event remains a favorite among our teammates — 28 of whom participated this year, raking the lawns of seniors and individuals with disabilities in our community.
Sioux Empire United Way
One of our many longstanding traditions is that we hold an internal United Way campaign each year to raise funds for the local organization.
During the 2024 campaign, our teammates, retirees, and shareholders donated $150,354 of their own money. Since the Bank matches donated funds dollar for dollar, we were able to contribute a total of $300,708 to the Sioux Empire United Way for 2025.
Additionally, our internal United Way committee hosted a bake sale in which teammates could donate and subsequently purchase an array of baked goods. We raised $700 through this event!
Sioux Falls Area Humane Society
In April, a group of 12 teammates visited the Sioux Falls Area Humane Society to do some cleaning, as well as to bond with the cats and dogs at the shelter. They even made a new friend, Brutus!
Sioux Falls Cares
This was one of our biggest volunteer events of the year! In December, 32 teammates offered their time to pick up and deliver donated items — “Christmas in a box” — to local families for Sioux Falls Cares.
The Banquet
Just like with Feeding South Dakota, we make sure to volunteer at The Banquet multiple times a year to help address food insecurity in our area.
A total of 15 teammates volunteered at The Banquet on our behalf this year, preparing and serving an evening meal downtown in March and again in August.
The Foster Network
In August, 12 teammates volunteered with The Foster Network to help local kids and their families pick out donated clothing and school supplies for the upcoming school year.
The Outdoor Campus
Do you enjoy spending time with nature at The Outdoor Campus? So do our teammates!
Eleven of them volunteered at the local nature park in June, cleaning up the grounds by weeding, trimming trees, and replanting lilies.
Veterans Community Project
In addition to sponsoring a house at the Veterans Community Project in Sioux Falls, we enjoy volunteering at the tiny-home community a couple times a year.
Ten of our teammates, which included veterans Scott Hirsch and Jeff Weber, helped construct one of the 25 tiny homes during an outing in May.
Then, six teammates volunteered there in September — this time including veterans Kade Larson and Jeff Weber — to clean a house, paint, and prepare it for move-in.
Supporting local communities in 2024
As you can tell, we’re incredibly passionate about supporting local communities and had a lot of fun doing so this year. Chances are we even supported an organization that you or someone you know has been affected by.
While these are just the ways our teammates gave back on Bank time (with that sweet perk we offer called Volunteer Time Off), many of them can be found volunteering on their own with the organizations closest to their hearts. When you see them around, don’t be shy: say hello!
If you feel so inclined, follow us on Facebook or our other social media accounts to see where we volunteer and which local organizations we support throughout 2025.
And if you like what you see and want to get in on the action, why not take a look at our open positions for a potential career opportunity? We’d love to include you in our next volunteering and stewardship recap, if you know what we mean.
