I have lost track of how many presidential elections I have gone through since I started working for electric cooperatives in the early 1980s. The number really isn’t relevant. The lessons learned over the decades are what is most important.
I have learned to not get excited, remain calm and settle in for the long game. The politics and rhetoric of each divisive and drawn-out campaign often sound far worse than the reality of any four-year term, regardless of the party. Why? That’s an easy answer: Both sides want to get elected again and the next election campaign starts the day after the inauguration.
At the federal level, Cherryland works with the National Rural Electric Cooperative Association (NRECA). NRECA has dozens of lobbyists who work the halls of Congress dealing with well over 100 issues that affect 900 electric cooperatives in 48 states. NRECA is adept at dealing with both sides of the aisle and has been since the early 1960s.
Infrastructure will be near the top of the agenda for President Biden. The leader in this area will be broadband in rural areas. There will soon be 400 electric cooperatives in the fiber business across the country. While Cherryland is not one of these, we are facilitating projects with private companies to utilize our rights-of-way.
Democrats and Republicans both serve rural cooperative areas. Broadband will be an area that they can agree on. NRECA will be one of a number of entities trying to bridge the gaps to bring them together to improve everyone’s access to the internet as the country adapts to some manner of long-term working from home after the pandemic.
A Green New Deal simply won’t happen in the years ahead. Will we work on climate change? Absolutely. Climate change legislation will be tempered by the Republican-led Senate and a weakened Democratic majority in the House. The battle for control of the House in just two short years almost assures no comprehensive legislation on climate.
Instead, President Biden will use his executive powers to roll back some of the changes the Trump executive orders put in place. Every utility in the country is expecting the rollbacks. The first is likely to be rejoining the Paris Climate Agreement. The U.S. is hitting the numbers in this agreement already. So, it will be an easy win for the new administration and a “no never mind” in the utility world.
Going forward, Republicans will not want to be categorized as anti-environment and Democrats will not want to go all the way to the Green New Deal left. Neither can get re-elected unless they steer toward the middle. This will allow for some bipartisan discussions on climate issues like electric vehicles.
EVs will provide an opportunity for both sides to claim they created jobs while saving the environment. Both statements will be true. The winner will be utilities like Cherryland who are prepared and ready to serve the increased electric load that EVs will bring. In turn, every member wins when sales go up and rates remain stable.
So, despite whatever your news channel of choice tells you, there are plenty of opportunities for cooperation and improvements over the next four years. There will surely be bumps in the road, but they are ruts we have covered in the past. There is no doom and gloom in our political future. There is just one more winding path of change that we have navigated many times before.
Well put. Time for us all to exhale and think on the areas of agreement where we’ll all benefit (reliable, cheap, and clean power and broadband is an obvious one).
Now a couple specific questions about what you wrote:
What are some of the private broadband projects that might utilize Cherryland’s right of way?
Where in the Cherryland service area are we likely to have better internet options soon as a result?
What will be done to keep your right of ways clean and organized? I’ve seen places especially near the old cities on the east coast where there’s a spaghetti of lines that gets strung when fiber starts getting rolled out, leading both to just disorganized-looking messes on the utility poles, and more critically to difficultly finding and maintaining broken links when then occur, and hope we never see that here.
We have worked with 186 Connect out of Rapid City in areas they cover around Skekemog Lake and Northport. We have had conversations with Acentek and have been trying to work out the details of a pilot project in the Thompsonville area. Discussions with the Grand Traverse Band have stopped and started over the last couple years. A law was passed last year in Michigan that authorizes us to use our easements to provide broadband so we are open to any private entity that wants to attach to our lines.
Better internet options should be available in Thompsonville, Copemish, Northport and Williamsburg areas to name a few.
Engineering standards on pole attachments will keep right of way organized as will our commitment to reliability. Trust me, when things get messy, I get comments. We are not going to get a rat’s nest on our poles. – Tony Anderson
Thank you, Tony! Very refreshing tone in this article! A nice change of pace from the mainstream doom and gloom you mentioned! Thank you, sir!
Unfortunately, modern media is dominated by extremes on both ends of the political spectrum (it sells papers and generates views). Thank you for speaking for the vast majority of people in the middle of the bell curve, and demonstrating that while “common sense” is not generally “common” in today’s political discussion, it still exists.
Wow! You’ve got my attention. Consumers will benefit under your leadership.
Very to the point and optimistic. After such a rough year at so many levels it’s good to hear some optimism and rhetoric.
Oops meant to say NO rhetoric. Sorry about that.
This is not a normal election. Dominion is involved. The same IT company that runs Venezuela elections. Caesar Chavez and Mudoro get re-elected with 60 to 70% of the vote. Those who pulled this off will never lose another election.
It’s 11 Presidential elections according to my count Tony. Hope that helps. 🙂
Wise words.
Spoken like a true leftist, cant wait to see what the trash brings to our nation now. Climate change? what a joke.
You should really pay more attention to the news. Republicans no longer lead the Senate. Democrats control all the levers of power. Cause for concern to say the least.
These articles are written 30 some days in advance. Obviously, I went with past history in Georgia run off elections and was wrong. The main message still stands but thanks for the comment.