More than 260 members and their families attended Menard Electric Cooperative’s 86th Annual Meeting on July 10th at Pleasant Plains High School. Members elected directors, learned more about the cooperative, enjoyed a pork chop dinner and snow cones, and visited with neighbors and co-op employees. Each registered membership received a $15 bill credit and bamboo cutting board and was entered into a prize drawing.
During the business meeting General Manager Alisha Anker spotlighted some of the co-op’s achievements and happenings throughout the year, giving some statistics such as 51 new member-owned distributed solar systems added, bringing the total to approximately 250 in all, and installation of 4.2 miles of new underground line and 25.2 miles of overhead line.
She discussed the co-op’s commitment to reducing line loss and how line upgrades and vegetation management have contributed to a continuing lowering of this number, resulting in savings to the co-op and its members.
Board President Warren Goetsch discussed the co-op’s powerful roots and commitment to exploring new ways to serve members in the future. He encouraged members to visit voicesforcooperativepower.com to learn more about ways to engage with the legislators setting energy policies and how those policies are affecting co-ops. “The message must not come from just the grass tops. Like the efforts which enabled the earliest members of Menard Electric to thrive and bring electricity to our service territory in the 1930s, we need your help from the grass roots.”See his Video Report Here
Board Treasurer Dennis Ryan also touched on how electric generation supply policies could impact wholesale power costs; these costs are the co-op’s largest expense at $0.64 per dollar of revenue. He walked through the financial statements printed for members and spoke of a recent $922,000 in Capital Credits returned to members who had service in 2002 and 2003. See his Video Report Here.
The co-op is governed by a Board of Directors made up of nine members elected from and by the membership to serve three-year terms. Each year three districts are up for election. This year D. Jay Frye, District 5 and Gary Martin, District 2 ran unopposed and were re-elected. Two candidates ran for District 9, incumbent Donald McMillan and Rex Muir, Jr. After a ballot vote by members, Rex Muir, Jr. of Buffalo was elected.
More information about the meeting is printed in the August Illinois Country Living magazine.