Co-op posts milestones for 76th annual meeting

It was 1937 when a group of neighbors formed a cooperative to bring electrical power to the Flathead’s rural countryside. By December 1938, about 82 miles of line was energized and 117 farm homes received electrical power for the first time.

Since then, the Flathead Electrical Cooperative has grown to 47,000 members, with 3,800 miles of line serving the Flathead Valley, Libby and an isolated stretch of land near Cooke City. Flathead Electric is Montana’s second-largest electrical utility.

The Co-op is owned and operated by and for the benefit of its members. A nine-member board of trustees governs the Co-op, and to witness good, old-fashioned democracy in action, one need only attend one of the Co-op’s annual membership meetings.

According to the Co-op’s 2012 annual review, operating revenues increased about 1 percent over 2011 while operating expenses increased about 6 percent. The largest expense was the cost of purchasing power, about $49.5 million, which increased about 11.8 percent from 2011. That $5.2 million increase largely accounts for the decline in net margins from $6.3 million in 2011 to $1.6 million in 2012.

The Co-op’s long-term debt increased by 2 percent from 2011, reaching $163 million. The annual interest payment on that debt, however, fell by nearly 4 percent to $8.2 million.

The Co-op took on about $10 million in additional debt in January with a loan from the National Rural Utilities Cooperative Finance Corporation. That money was used for construction of the new substation in Hungry Horse and removal of the substation in Bad Rock Canyon, along with replacement of poles and lines across the valley, at a total cost of about $14 million.

Notable achievements in 2012 include:

• About $2.4 million in capital credits were distributed to about 38,000 current and former Co-op members. More than $70,000 in scholarships and other educational programs was awarded to local youths using unclaimed capital credits.

• The Co-op agreed to purchase up to 2.5 megawatts of power from Stoltze Land & Lumber Co., which is building a new boiler at its Half Moon lumber mill that will generate electrical power.

• The Co-op fronted the city of Whitefish money to rehabilitate a hydroelectric plant at the city reservoir in exchange for future power produced by the plant.

• The Bonneville Power Administration awarded the Co-op top honors for Excellence in Energy Efficiency.

• About 70 members took advantage of the Co-op’s new energy efficiency loan program, with $250,000 in loans.

• Members who took their old energy-inefficient freezers and refrigerators to the county landfill received a $50 credit from the Co-op.

Last week, the Co-op announced it had agreed to allow Columbia Falls-based Zinc Air Inc. to install one of its large batteries at the Co-op’s Evergreen campus.

The batteries are intended to stabilize ups and downs in power supply for smart grid systems and solar or wind generation. Zinc Air has plans for commercial applications in 2014.

The Co-op’s 76th annual members meeting will take place at the Christian Center, in Kalispell, on Saturday, March 16, with registration and refreshments at 8:30 a.m. and a short business meeting at 10 a.m. Prize drawings and two $500 scholarships will be offered through the meeting.

Three incumbent board members are up for re-election — Chris Byrd, District 1, Columbia Falls to Essex; Doug Grob, District 4, Helena Flats to Columbia Falls Stage Road; and George Taylor, District 7, south Kalispell. Candidates will present three-minute talks, and a mail-in election will be held after the meeting.