The People Behind a Good Day

An afternoon at a pumpkin patch goes quickly. The people who grow those pumpkins have been working toward it for months.

This month’s feature, starting on Page 4, visits Pick’N Patch in Cove. I hope you get to know the people behind the business. What they grow gives us a reason to get out for an afternoon and spend a little time together.

Buying something grown nearby is a straightforward way to support the people who grew it. So is spending a dollar with any of the thousands of businesses on Oregon Trail Electric Cooperative lines,from Main Street storefronts to farm shops.

After a devastating wildfire season all around us, October is a good time to look at the fire risks inside our homes. In 2024, a home fire was reported somewhere in this country every 96 seconds. Our home fire safety feature on Pages 28-29 covers cooking and electrical safety, along with space heaters, rechargeable batteries and smoke alarms. Please use these pages to take a fresh look around your own home. A smoke alarm needs your attention long before you need it.

The same goes for the electric system. We buy and deliver electricity in Baker, Grant, Harney and Union counties for OTEC’s 23,000-plus member-owners. Oregon has never recorded a fire season this large, with more than 2 million acres burned. The power we buy from Bonneville Power Administration is our single-largest expense, nearly half of what it costs to run the cooperative. We would rather you spend an afternoon at a pumpkin patch than worry about any of this. That is our job.

Our National Co-op Month story on Page 25 explains how OTEC can return capital credits to member-owners when its financial condition allows and the board approves. In December, the board approved a $3 million retirement, the 29th consecutive year OTEC has returned capital credits. In total, OTEC has returned more than $60 million in capital credits.

The story also shows money returned to OTEC by its cooperative partners. OTEC is a member-owner, too. We belong to cooperatives that help finance our electric system, insure our facilities and equipment and provide the enterprise-wide software behind our financial and billing systems.

The lender in that group is the National Rural Utilities Cooperative Finance Corp., or CFC. It is an entity that rural electric cooperatives built to help finance their systems. In 1988, a cooperative that had never sent a bill needed $33 million to buy the system. CFC lent it. Without that network, OTEC would most likely not exist.

The proposed purchase of Idaho Power’s Oregon service territory is under regulatory review. If it is approved, CFC would finance the purchase. Under the proposal, Idaho Power’s Oregon customers would become OTEC member-owners, with a vote in board elections and the support of the same cooperative network that helps us serve you. You can follow the proposal at otec.coop/IdahoPower. Local ownership does not mean doing everything alone. It means knowing the people we serve and finding the right partners to help us serve them. Those partnerships help us do our job. They do not do it for us.

Enjoy what your neighbors have grown this October. Take a little time with the people who spent months making that afternoon possible.
- Les Penning, CEO

To read more of the stories mentioned above : click here.