www.washingtonelectric.coop Co-op Currents, January/February 2004, Page 3

A Successful First Year For WEC’s Community Fund

abot Commons, a senior assisted-living facility in Cabot. . . Central Vermont Adult Basic Education in Barre. . . Our House of Central Vermont, a resource center fighting child abuse. . . the People’s Health and Wellness Clinic, which provides affordable medical care on a sliding scale for people in need.

These were among more than two dozen local non-profit organizations and programs that received financial support last year from Washington Electric Cooperative.

2003 was the first year of operation for WEC’s Community Fund. The Fund was created to enable the Co-op to be more engaged in the good works that citizens and organizations are performing for others within our scattered rural neighborhoods.

At the close of 2003, General Manager Avram Patt reported on its first-year activities to the Board of Directors. The news was good, for two reasons.

First, the Community Fund had made donations, in modest amounts, totaling $6,929 to local causes. Second, the response of Co-op members who were invited to contribute their 2003 capital credit benefits to the Fund exceeded some people’s expectations.

Certainly that was true for Patt.

“We sent out a letter last summer before capital credit refunds were issued, explaining the new Fund to our members and providing them an opportunity to contribute to the Fund instead of claiming their 2003 distributions,” said the manager. “We didn’t know what we would get, but I thought anything above $10,000 would be a good result. As it happened, we got donations totaling more than $14,000.”

It was important that contributions to the Community Fund be voluntary. The Board seeded the Fund for the first year with a one-time allocation of $10,000 from general revenues, knowing that practice could not be continued because revenues belong to the membership. (The $10,000 was a small enough sum not to affect operations or rates.) As WEC Director Richard Rubin said at the time, “Members can make their own charitable contributions without our help.”

But Rubin was also the driving force for creating a fund for local giving. Part of the co-op philosophy, reflected in the principles adopted in 1995 by the International Cooperative Alliance, is for cooperatives of all kinds to support organizations and charities that improve community life. The initial $10,000 got the ball rolling; the voluntary contributions of $14,000 assure that the program will continue. The Board intends to invite members once again to contribute their capital credit distributions (which mostly range from $10 to $40, and would otherwise be credited to members’ November electric bills) if the annual capital credit refund program is repeated, as expected, next fall.

To provide guidelines for Community Fund grants, the Board of Directors adopted a policy in 2002. It favors organizations that are either extremely local (to particular towns and villages) or which, like the People’s Health and Wellness Clinic, are widely available to people in central Vermont, including the Co-op’s service territory. The policy calls for donations to organizations that are “financially viable” and “broadly supported in the communities they serve.” The Fund does not give to religious or political organizations.

Those criteria generally explain why applications from some worthy causes – such as large national charities, or organizations that operate near but not in WEC’s service territory – were not approved.

“The Fund had a good first year,” said Director Rubin. “We were pleased with the number of contributions we got, and we’re hopeful that after people see how the donations were distributed – what kinds of organizations we gave to and their geographical representation around the Co-op’s service territory – the percentage of contributions will increase next time.”
       Operationally, certain adjustments need to be made, but a year ’s experience has provided a sense of how many requests the Co-op can expect from hopeful applicants and how far the money might stretch. “This was a good model for model for future years,” said Rubin. “Organizationally we’re in a strong position for 2004.”
     A list of the organizations receiving donations from WEC’s Community Fund appears on page 3. Co-op members who wish to see Patt’s report to the Board of Directors – which includes the amounts given and details of requests not funded – are invited to call Washington Electric Cooperative in East Montpelier.