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Doug Bechtel
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Well, another county fair has come and gone. We made a lot of changes this year - probably the most significant was that we put away our electric safety demonstration board. A few people missed it, but by and large, we came away with the impression that you had seen it often enough.
I really have to give a lot of credit to all the OPALCO people and suppliers who worked so hard to put our county fair booth together and spent their weekend at the booth or giving bucket truck rides. I think the most popular display for the kids (regardless of their age) was a ride into the air in our bucket truck. The truck was in operation almost continuously Friday and Saturday. Several people suggested that we put a big OPALCO sign around so that people would realize it was us.
We also had a lot of comments on the energy saving clothes washing machines. These continue to get a lot of support within San Juan County since they save both water and electricity. In fact, my wife, Marie, and I are looking at getting one for ourselves. There was some interest in our load management system and the display that we had on surge suppressers. A lot of thanks to All Phase Electric for putting the surge suppresser display together and being around to answer questions.
For the first time this year, our employees circulated a short questionnaire on how you, our members, view OPALCO and what we might do to serve you better. Hundreds of them were filled out, and they are currently being tabulated. We received lots of positive feedback from our members on our operations and our hard work to reduce outages. Several recent national surveys have pointed out that it is the employees of co-ops who make the organizations a success. OPALCO has a great group of employees who are very dedicated to the organization and our members, and they work very hard to earn your appreciation. It is good to get positive feedback like we did at the fair.
I was surprised at the number of you who didn't understand that you own and control OPALCO. We need to work harder on education in this regard.
As usual, you had many comments on our operations. Let me share a few comments in answer to the question of what OPALCO might do to improve:
- "Lower your rates."
- "Continue undergrounding power lines."
- "I like the load management system."
- "Tell us about outages before they happen." (We do for all planned outages.)
- "Have reachable personnel during outages."
- "Don't let deregulation clip your wings."
- "Please stay afloat."
- "Get rid of WPPSS."
Several of you reported that you were very happy with the speed, willingness and friendliness of OPALCO people in emergency situations. I will let you know when we tabulate the answers to the other questions to see how we are doing.
As for the fair, we are already making plans for next year. We want to make our display even more exciting and useful to you.
Doug Bechtel
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