2021 was certainly a challenging year, but we are proud to say St. Croix Electric Co-op managed through it to a financially successful year – despite COVID, inflation, supply chain issues and a very competitive environment for workers.

COVID affected not only our day-to-day operating procedures but once again led to a decrease from budgeted expenses associated with employee training and travel, event sponsorships and more. At times, we had multiple employees absent due to COVID. Luckily, our dedicated, hard-working staff was able to continue providing the excellent customer service and reliability our members expect.
Another effect of COVID was the second year of a Drive-In Annual Meeting. We have scheduled our 2022 Annual Meeting for Thursday, May 5 at the co-op office. The format will be announced as it draws closer.

From January 2021 to December 2021, we saw an average 10% increase in the price of goods purchased to build new services and maintain our existing infrastructure. Electric utilities across the country are investing to make the electrical grid more resilient. The unpredictable weather causing ice storms, hurricanes and wildfires, as well as transportation delays, are driving up demand for our very specialized equipment. At the same time, the industry is not immune to the general supply chain issues we are all facing.

For example, it has been reported that the cost to unload shipping containers at ports of entry in 2020 was around $2,000 and through the course of 2021 the cost to just lift the same container off the ship and onto land has increased close to $20,000!

In 2020, we saw transformer lead times increase from an average of 12-14 weeks to 52-plus weeks for some of the larger specialty-sized transformers. In 2021, some suppliers began putting co-ops on allocations – we might order 200 transformers in a year, but instead of receiving them in spring just prior to construction season, we will receive five shipments of 40 transformers spread throughout the year.    

Additionally, on Aug. 28, 2021, the US Postal Service increased postage rates, which affected both our paper bill mailing and our printed newsletters. Since the initial $200/month jump in postage, we are happy to report we have seen a DECREASE in postage each month due to a net increase of more than 700 paperless billing accounts since September bills were mailed! Thank you to all who switched to paperless. 

Despite all the challenges we faced in 2021, we are proud to have managed the Cooperative to a financially successful year. Our expenses were slightly under budget, but we had very strong sales. With that, along with deferred revenue from 2020 and credits from our power supplier, we were able to credit back to members almost $900,000 as Power Cost Adjustments on your bills! 

Looking ahead to 2022 … 

Our Board of Directors recently approved the 2022 Budget. We anticipate being able to manage 2022 without needing an overall rate increase to our members, despite continued projected increases of 10-12% in costs of purchased goods. 

We also anticipate streamlining some lighting rates, cleaning up a few older rates and introducing a few new pilot rate options that are currently under design, and that we are quite excited about. More to come on those in future newsletters. Due to inflation, inventory concerns and continued supply chain delays, we have found it necessary to start placing some supply orders for 2023 already.   

We are proud to have had financial success the past few years in such challenging times without a rate increase and 2022 is shaping up to be another challenging year for SCEC management. Rest assured, the team is up to the task and will continue to work diligently to provide our members with safe, reliable and affordable power. It is always our highest priority.