October is National Co-op month, and Mountain View Electric Association Inc. celebrated by holding an annual Lamplighter dinner meeting for their co-op members on Oct. 22. This year, The Wedgewood Wedding & Banquet Center in Black Forest hosted the event. Donna Anderson-Van Ness, MVEA assistant secretary, reported on capital credit retirement funds. Co-op members receive a share of the retired capital credits every year, which is determined by the MVEA Board of Directors. The total retired this year is $4,308,015. Members are invited to visit their local MVEA office to learn about capital credits ó and receive a free pie. Jim Herron, MVEA chief executive officer, introduced Rep. Tim Geitner and his wife Carrie Geitner, candidate for the El Paso County District 2 Commission seat. Herron also acknowledged MVEA retirees, Operation Round Up Board Members and other employees in the audience. Herron said, after 31 years of service, Jack Wolfe, MVEA attorney, will retire at the end of 2019. Herron discussed the Operation Round Up program, where members have the option to round up their bill to the next dollar. Herron said the average yearly total for members who participate equals $5.50 and the maximum amount is $11.88. The money is used to provide assistance to members who are dealing with disastrous situations that prevent them from being able to take care of their basic needs. MVEA is still seeing growth, Herron said. They are currently at about 57,000 meters and have been adding about 2,000 meters a year. He said they are looking at the infrastructure needed to build or upgrade in the future years, and they contributed $20 million toward growth this year. MVEA has been using digital meters for more than 20 years, and they are in the process of upgrading those meters, Herron said. Members will have more insight into their electric usage by being able to monitor daily and hourly usage, plus they have the ability to see patterns to help budget for future bills. MVEA will be able to respond to outages faster and know when everyone is back online.Herron said the upgrades were launched in August 2019 and will take an estimated 18 months to complete. He said one of the things people always ask him is how their bills will be impacted in the future. ìOne of the things we donít have control over is legislation,î he said. ìThere was legislation passed this year, House Bill 19-1261, Climate Action Plan to Reduce Pollution, and what concerns us about this bill is that the Air Quality Control Commission is going to develop regulations to achieve the House bill goals, which is an unknown, and could affect your bills.î He also said the roadmap to 100 percent renewable energy and bold climate action was also passed by Gov. Jared Polis this year, and they have yet to see how that will affect them.Herron talked about the LED Energy Efficiency Rebate Program that Tri-State Generation and Transmission offers to members. He said this is the last year Tri-State will be offering the program. The deadline to get rebates in is Dec. 30, 2019.The dinner meeting ended after a question and answer session.
