Casey Barrett, president and CEO of the San Angelo-based Texas Bank, has been appointed the newest member of Advantage Health Plans Trust’s (AHPT) board of trustees. A member of Oklahoma City, Oklahoma-based AHPT since 2012, Barrett joined the board as a trustee in June 2020. He fills one of two Texas seats on the board and will serve for three years (2020–23). A graduate of Texas Tech University and the Southwestern Graduate School of Banking at Southern Methodist University, Barrett is the fourth president of Texas Bank.

Jay Gober, president of Graham-based First State Bank since it was chartered in 1983, is leaving the AHPT board of trustees, having completed his term. He joined the board of trustees in 2017 and during his tenure, AHPT has accomplished rate adjustments averaging a modest 5 percent, trending below market averages. Gober’s bank also contributed to plan savings totaling almost $4 million annually through the company’s signature benefit program, KPPFree.

“These past three years, Advantage has benefited from a period of stability within the plan, enriched benefits and improved cost containment,” AHPT says in a recent press release. “We wish Jay well and thank him for his years of service!”

When AHPT launched in 1976, it was based on the idea of shared responsibility—bankers joining together to pool the claims costs for their employees’ health benefits. The organization’s board of trustees’ primary job is to make sure that things are running smoothly and to save AHPT and its client’s money. The trustees do this by being fiscally intelligent and making good business decisions like they do at their bank. AHPT has experienced amazing growth in Texas in recent years, now boasting more than 1,600 members in the Lone Star State.