Case in Point – June 2023
Until last year, Harney Electric General Manager Fred Flippence had never been to Washington, D.C. Now, after 3 work trips in a year,...
Until last year, Harney Electric General Manager Fred Flippence had never been to Washington, D.C. Now, after 3 work trips in a year,...
I’ve written extensively about the days the lights came on in rural America in my two books on rural electrification. As it turns...
The Oregon Legislative Assembly is underway in Salem, with leaders of both parties pledging to take on some big challenges that were front...
She hadn’t responded to my email, which was odd because normally Erika Paleck wrote back to me within minutes. While she was a...
Last month, I participated in a keynote panel at the Oregon Connections Conference in Ashland on the status of broadband deployment in our...
While it’s hard to dispute our political process has its challenges, sometimes a bit of common sense emerges and gives us hope. In...
The sun bears down on us as we stand on a ridgeline at Mary’s Peak—the highest mountain on Oregon’s coast range—looking down at...
There seems to be no end to studies about the future of the lower Snake River dams—a critical component of the Federal Columbia...
This month, I was honored to finish my term as the president of the Rural Electric Statewide Managers Association (RESMA). This group of...
The fencing, it appeared, had been taken down, making Capitol Hill look less like a fortress. It had been three years since I...
You may have noticed this month’s Ruralite feature story has a different look and tone. We are not writing about the future of...
The question isn’t who is running for governor of Oregon. The question is, “Who isn’t?” And why not? It’s the first time in...
The Oregon Legislature will soon close its 35-day short session after tackling a few big-ticket items before the political season begins. Just like...
It was a rough way to start the year in the Pacific Northwest. As this month’s feature story details, electric co-ops took a...
A new year always brings change, but 2022 is promising upheaval across Oregon’s political landscape. U.S. Rep. Peter DeFazio has announced his retirement...
How do you find a silver lining in a pandemic? It’s a hard task. But Wasco Electric Director Bob Durham certainly found one...
It was, as they say in Hollywood, a production nearly two years in the making. While that was the promotion for Cecil DeMille’s...
A few months ago, I wrote about being free from the grips of the pandemic and how life was going to resume to...
My wife is Hawaiian, and that has its benefits. We vacationed on the islands this summer, taking advantage of a few hideaway beaches...
Who do you trust when things are on the line? If you are a Portland Trail Blazer fan, the answer is obvious: Damian...
How will we be remembered? That question is a central theme that runs through the books of presidential historian and best-selling author Doris...
Now we know how the cicadas feel. No, we have not been buried underground for 17 years in subterranean lairs like the Brood...
As I write this column, the Oregon House of Representatives is preparing to consider Oregon Rural Electric Cooperative Association (ORECA)-supported legislation (HB 2654)...
If you pay attention to news about the electric utility industry, you will hear and read a lot about a future with “100%...
I live next to a forest, and on the evening of Friday, February 12, I thought Paul Bunyan was outside my window. As...
“I need you to disappear.” I heard this request as a young Capitol Hill staffer when a Republican congressman asked a Democratic colleague...
“What do you want to do when the pandemic is over?” I asked my children this question over the holidays and received answers...
I guess it is the new normal that conducting your association’s annual meeting in the shadow of an exercise bike is no big...
I wondered what the woman in the flowered dress was searching for in the rubble. Surprisingly, there was not a trace of smoke...
We had to decide what to take. But the real question was, “What do we really need?” Evacuating our home was not something...
I thought for sure Gov. Kate Brown’s staff would cancel our meeting. She is, after all, an exceptionally busy leader dealing with multiple...
There are countless differing perspectives about the coronavirus epidemic, but hopefully we all agree the loss of life is tragic, wherever it occurs....
I took a call from National Public Radio the other day, which I concede is not a regular occurrence. The reporter, who was...
OK, I was wrong. A few months ago, we published my column expressing hope that I would soon be writing about some topic...
I run the Oregon Rural Electric Cooperative Association under the watchful eye of Charlton Heston. He’s glaring down in my new home office...
This is the last column I ever wanted to write. I’d rather use this space to write about anything else related to electric...
Oregon’s electric cooperative leaders are some of the friendliest people I have encountered. They are reasonable, courteous to a fault and slow to...
Don’t blink. The Oregon Legislature convenes this month, and there are some large questions to be answered. Unlike the odd-year slog of a...
It was a good way to end the year. In 2019, I used this page several times to advocate for passage of the...
We packed a lot into the Oregon Rural Electric Cooperative Association annual meeting last month. We had excellent presentations from energy experts, legislators,...
One of the most challenging things about planning an Oregon Rural Electric Cooperative Association annual meeting is not what content to include in...
The other day, I looked up from my computer at work and observed a group of deer right outside my window looking at...
I am not what you would call a daredevil. Sure, I like adventure as much as the next guy, but it’s more along...
The story is familiar: Forests are burning and oceans are rising because of climate change. Something needed to be done. The solution? Cap-and-trade...
What is that on the cover of our magazine? A graphic of a U.S. Senate bill? We have a tradition of putting extraordinary...
Recently, I drove 3½ hours to attend an annual meeting of one of my electric cooperative members. It was a long day for...
My middle-school-age daughter is studying government, and it’s been a bit humbling. She is a smart girl, and I’ve looked at her homework....
As evidenced by our feature story this month, this winter tested the strength of the Oregon rural electric program like I have not...
There will be plenty to talk about. That is my message to the scores of electric cooperative leaders who will descend upon Salem...
Any organization is smart to look ahead, but occasionally you also need to return to your roots. In January, the Oregon Rural Electric...
Well, that went fast. It was 10 years ago last month that the Cases rolled into Oregon from Washington, D.C., during one of...
Last month, I had the opportunity to interview former House Speaker Newt Gingrich at a post-election forum sponsored by the National Rural Utilities...
“Who do you have coming this year?” It’s a question I get quite often from my members around annual meeting time. It’s the...
My family and I are big fans of the Mission Impossible movies and Impossible Missions Force agent Ethan Hunt, played by Tom Cruise....
Summer is winding down, and school is in session for my kids. Thank goodness. No longer will I have to wither under 90-degree...
The other day, I met Amelia Earhart. OK, not the Amelia Earhart, the legendary aviator who disappeared over the Pacific Ocean in 1937....
One of the highlights of my summer is ORECA’s mid-year meeting in July. As part of the meeting, my board of directors and...
It’s not easy to pass a new law. I have watched countless bills be introduced and then fail to get a congressional hearing,...
I had to admit to a little nostalgia, even though the ornate U.S. House of Representatives committee room largely represented a history of...
It was right under my nose—or rather, in my mailbox—the whole time. When we moved from the Washington, D.C., area to Wilsonville, our...
How’s it going to end? As a former fiction writer, that’s the question I wanted my readers to be asking, breathlessly turning pages...
For the past few months, the Oregon Rural Electric Cooperative Association has worked collaboratively with the Oregon Legislature’s Clean Energy Jobs Utilities and...
The Oregon Rural Electric Cooperative Association wrapped up the year by celebrating its 75th anniversary at the annual meeting in Salem in November....
In November, legislative work groups in Salem concluded their efforts to write a cap-and-trade bill for the 2018 short session. Conceived by state...
ORECA turned 75 years old this year—a landmark we will celebrate this month at our annual meeting. In preparation for the celebration, I...
“It seems like the apocalypse is upon us.” A friend of mine made that observation in early September as what seemed like every...
How do you tell the secretary of energy that his policy on the sale of the power marketing administrations is misguided and punitive?...
What happened in the U.S. House of Representatives on June 21, 2017, reminds me of Shirley Povich’s classic lead paragraph in the Washington...
I have a few random thoughts as we pass the halfway point of the year, the Oregon Legislature wraps up and the U.S....
The word seems to be getting out. Recently, a bipartisan group of Oregon legislators wrote Gov. Kate Brown urging her to “constructively participate...
There are not a lot of new ideas coming out of Washington, D.C., but there are a lot of dumb old ones. I...
No one can say electric cooperative leaders don’t have heart. We are only a few weeks removed from ORECA’s Legislative Day in Salem,...
Oregon electric cooperative leaders will descend upon the state Capitol this month to promote common-sense policies that allow us to provide our members...
Opening the box isn’t exactly like opening a Christmas present, but there is still a sense of anticipation. The scene is the opening...
One of my favorite holiday events each year is our annual co-op lunch in Salem with our state legislators. It’s a bit of...
It has been a long time since I’ve seen so many stories on rural America—about four years. It seems that during every presidential...
Not one of the several hundred attendees of the National Rural Electric Cooperative Association Region 7 and 9 ACRE breakfast in October believed...