WATT’S UP SUWANNEE VALLEY ELECTRIC COOPERATIVE EMPLOYEE AND RETIREE NEWSLETTER | SPRING 2020
from the CEO Thank you for adapting to these challenging times An organization's ability to adapt is demonstrated by how it keeps up with changing market conditions or shifting environmental factors. This could be due to challenges like new laws, changing consumer demands and expectations, and even pandemics. As we have seen in recent months, our industry is not immune to these kinds of forces. In January, the Florida Supreme Court made a ruling that prevented a citizen’s initiative for restructuring the state’s electricity market from appearing on the 2020 ballot. While the initiative was unsuccessful this time, I’m sure we’ll see a variation of it again in the not-so-distant future.
SMORE
Safety Member Experience Outreach to Community Reliability Economic Viability
VALUE PER POINT
POINTS AVAILABLE
SMORE TRACKER
POINTS ACHIEVED
$64
10.00
QUARTERLY YTD
8.39
SAFETY
Safety is Still the Only Way SVEC implemented numerous business continuity strategies following Florida’s safer at home order in April. These efforts, combined with the continued diligence and adaptability of all employees, have allowed the cooperative to serve consumermembers without any major issues. Members of the First Baptist Church of Live Oak also sewed and donated 100 masks for SVEC employees, which were quickly distributed and put to use.
And of course, we’re all aware of the challenges we’ve faced in the last few weeks due to COVID-19. I’m proud of the way you have responded to them. While we’ve been inconvenienced by the need to separate into teams and alternate days working from the office and home, we have gained experiences that will make us even more prepared to persevere through future disruptive See CEO, Page 6
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MEMBER EXPERIENCE
Tips to Create a Magical Customer Experience During a Crisis by John Formica
Department’s Community Clean Up day in early March. Together with other members of the community, the cemetery on Miller Street was cleaned and landscaped. Thank you to Maria and Francisco Suarez, Ashley and Thomas Johnson, John Robinson, Christy Tuckey, and Jon Little for assisting with the project.
CLICK IMAGE TO WATCH VIDEO
One way to demonstrate a magical customer experience is to make sure you and your staff are providing a great first impression. In this “Magic Minute,” I share an experience that I received from a local restaurant that my wife and I visited for takeout. Watching the video, you will see that it was not a magical experience. Based on my first impression, my perception was mostly that their staff could care less, when instead, I should have felt that this business truly appreciated having a customer during these challenging times. I wondered why the business owner would tolerate such a bad first impression, not only from the entrance of their store, but from their staff, if they really wanted to stay in business. Now is not the time to let down your guard. Go overboard to make sure every contact point with the customer experience is a magical one. Once this pandemic is over, people are going to be telling stories for a long time about this incredible time in our lives. The stories you want them to tell about your business will be the good things, not the bad.
Blood Drive The LifeSouth bloodmobile visited in late March and had a successful drive. A big thank you to Daniel Carver, Jodi Hughes, Austin Long, Dale Turman, Mike Guillery, Annette Bonds, Cathy Erixton, Paige Peacock, Mark Mosely, Jon Little, Erin Skeen, Joe Barclay and Chuck Millsap for your life-saving donations. A special shoutout goes to Austin Long for his automated donation, which takes significantly longer and helps burn victims and patients with severe infections by collecting double red cells, platelets or plasma.
Annual Meeting To help slow the spread of COVID-19, SVEC held a drive-thru registration for the 2020 Annual Meeting. The Live Oak Police Department was present and assisted with the direction of traffic. Registered members were gifted a $25 Visa gift card and $10 bill credit. The business portion of the meeting was streamed via Facebook Live. Despite the change in format, it was a great quorum for the co-op, with 1,026 members in attendance.
OUTREACH TO COMMUNITY Community Clean Up with LOPD
SVEC employees lent a helping hand at the Live Oak Police 2
“We’ve received a lot of good support from the community,” said Ryan Hart, Seminole’s director of communications and energy policy. “We continue to receive a lot of support from Putnam County for the project, and we’re very appreciative of that.” According to Project Director Thomas Reed, the projected finish date is October 2022, with commercial service beginning in early 2023. With the coronavirus pandemic, Hart said Seminole is in staffing diversification using CDC guidelines. “Folks who are able to work from home are working from home,” Hart said. “We’ve not experienced any delays during the pandemic, limiting contact between individuals to help reduce the spread of the virus.” The Seminole Generating Station is located on about 2,000 acres in Putnam County off U.S. 17 and went into operation in 1984. It employs about 270 workers while providing power to 22,151 meters in the county through Clay Electric. Reed said safety is a No. 1 priority during construction — for workers and motorists traveling near the construction site. Seminole said replacing one of the coal-fired units with its natural gas-fired plant will result in a 40% reduction of air pollutants and a 34% reduction in carbon dioxide emissions.
RELIABILITY
Seminole Charges On Excerpt from Wayne Smith, Palatka Daily News
ECONOMIC VIABILITY
Finances Amid the Pandemic Like most other businesses, the ultimate impact of COVID-19 to SVEC is unknown given the uncertainty of the pandemic. The cooperative continues to monitor the situation and remains hopeful that things will begin operating a little more “normally” soon. Thus far, some impacts include: • Loss of revenue due to waived late fees • Noncollectables/write-offs may increase due to suspension of disconnects for nonpayment. • Possible drop in commercial/industrial revenue due to businesses being forced to close or reduce operations • Increase in PPE expense
Seminole Electric’s $727 million project to build a new natural gas-fired unit at its Palatka plant remains on schedule. Seminole representatives updated Putnam County officials last week on the progress of the project. 3
Budget requests are being evaluated more thoroughly to see if there is a need to postpone items until things become a little more certain. In addition, SVEC is staying up to speed on all the government stimulus and assistance programs designed to help businesses who are impacted so that the co-op may be able to utilize programs we qualify for. Thankfully, lenders have eased financial debt covenants requirements for 2020 because they understand this is a very difficult time for many.
Despite the many uncertainties caused by COVID-19, SVEC will retire the budgeted $1.3M in capital credits this year. This will be the largest retirement amount to date and brings the total amount of capital credits retired over the life of the cooperative to about $16M.
Black Swans and Your 401(k) By Richard Schooley
The term black swan has been used to describe something that does not exist. It was a common expression in the 1600s until a Dutch explorer discovered actual black swans in Australia. In modern times a black swan is an unforeseen event; the Coronavirus is a black swan event. We cannot plan for a black swan event, but we can help manage the way through them. Unforeseen market moving events are why Dogwood Wealth Advisors are here; this is where we can add value.
servers and the network’s fiber backbone. A meeting room in the second half of the building is reserved for use as a makeshift “war room” and emergency bunker.
Robocall Scammers Are Taking Advantage of the COVID-19 Pandemic By ID Watchdog
According to the Federal Trade Commission (FTC), scammers are using illegal robocalls to seed coronavirus fears and trick victims into handing over money or personal information. Fraudsters are reportedly impersonating the Social Security Administration, offering fake coronavirus tests and promoting bogus cures among other tactics. Learn how to better protect yourself and your loved ones from coronavirus-related robocall scams.
Your stock allocation should be part of your long-term planning. We do not know what negative event may be on the horizon, so we test for downturns based on prior markets. This process helps us simulate returns and arrive at a probability of achieving your goals. A down market in the near term should not change your long-term plan. If you have an allocation aligned with your risk tolerance, the best action is to stay the course.
Robocall scammers may: • Promote fake cures and ask for payment over the phone • Offer HVAC duct cleaning as a way to protect against the virus • Take advantage of financial fears by offering scam student loan repayment plans or debt consolidation • Impersonate the Social Security Administration • Offer fake coronavirus tests to Medicare recipients • Push fraudulent testing services • Offer bogus low-priced health insurance • Offer medical equipment and testing to higher-risk individuals, such as those with diabetes • Promote work-at-home schemes
If you would like to start a financial plan or update an existing one, we are here to help. We can help answer questions like, “Am I still on track to retire?” and “What income should I expect in retirement?” We will get you through this crisis and yes, the black swans in the future.
ADMIN/CYBERSAFETY
Information Technology Building Installed The IT department’s hurricane-rated building has been delivered! This prefabricated building was built to withstand winds of up to 150 mph and will be the central location for SVEC’s production 4
Experts worry that some potential victims, including seniors, may be more vulnerable to these types of scams because of social distancing.
Tips to Better Protect Yourself and Your Loved Ones from COVID-19 Robocalls • Hang up immediately — Experts advise individuals to hang up immediately and avoid pressing any numbers. Some recordings may say that pressing a number will transfer the call to a live operator or remove the number from their call list, but in fact, it could lead to more robocalls. • Do not provide personal or financial information — The FBI advises that individuals never provide their username, password, date of birth, Social Security number, financial data or other personal information in response to a robocall. • Beware of scams regarding possible government-issued checks — The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) states that no one will call or text to verify personal information or bank account details in order to release the funds. The Treasury Department expects most people to receive their payments via direct deposit using information on file from prior tax filings. • Don’t trust caller ID — Scammers often fake the name and number that shows up on caller ID so it looks like the call
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originates from a government agency or a local number. According to the FCC, government agencies will never call you to ask for personal information or money. Be wary of unknown numbers — The FCC advises consumers not to respond to calls or texts from unknown numbers or any other suspicious numbers. Consider asking your phone provider if it offers call-blocking tools. Report the call — Report robocalls to the FTC on their FTC Complaint Assistant page. This action could help the FTC track down the scammers behind the call. What to Do If You Believe You Are a Victim If you believe you have been the victim of a robocall scam, report it to the FTC on their FTC Complaint Assistant page.
News from our EAP PLANNING FOR A POSITIVE FUTURE In addition to the stress and health worries, for many, the coronavirus has effectively shut our outside and community lives down. If you are sheltering from home and time is weighing heavily on your hands, why not turn a negative into a positive by devoting some of that time to personal and professional development? Here are some of the many training resources that you can access at the EAP website: • COVID-19 Resource Center offers resources to help you cope and deal productively with working remotely, from setting up a remote workspace and holding successful conference calls to working within and managing virtual teams. • Your EAP Training Center includes hundreds of online courses, tutorials, exercises and worksheets, all designed to help you assess personal skills, set objectives and attain goals. • Personal Finance Education Center includes 200 tutorials covering a wide range of money issues. Just some of the topics covered are budgeting, saving, credit, retirement, home buying and more. • If you are a supervisor or hope to become one, access an entire online curriculum of supervisory training resources to develop the key management skills. There are dozens of courses in the following disciplines: Regulatory Compliance, Core Competencies, Advanced Supervisory Skills and Team Leadership. To learn more and explore your options, simply log in to www.theEAP.com/TotalCare-EAP and click on the Training Center. Or if you need help, call 800-252-4555 to talk to someone about your personal development options.
CEO, continued from front
events. For example, we’ve learned what we need to do our jobs remotely if something were to happen to our buildings and how to conduct virtual meetings when we all can’t be together in the same room. Learning to adapt as an organization is crucial to remain-
ing successful in the long term, and because of COVID-19, we’re more confident than ever that we’ll be able to overcome the challenges we will face going forward. Mike
From our retirees… By Debbie Edwards My sister, Doreen, and I both sold our houses and have moved to Welaka, which is a very small town on the St Johns River. We are living in her motorhome on a campsite that is on Little Lake George. We have purchased a lot in Beechers Point Subdivision and are now in the process of pulling a building permit. We did get the dock built and have purchased a boat. Once the permit is issued, we will be able to move the motorhome over to the lot and stay there while building. While waiting on the permit, we have plenty of time for fishing, shrimping, crabbing and just cruising around in the boat. We love living here and are looking forward to getting started on our house.
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Family News …
Congratulations …
Check out Christine Moor’s turkey she shot on her family’s property in White Springs. Her brother, Chase, was with her and helped put her on the bird. It was a younger gobbler with an 8 3/4 inch beard.
Braxton Hicks has accepted a position as Staking Engineer. He has been filling the gap for staking as a result of Jimmy Bell leaving and will now permanently be in the staking position and will perform other engineering functions as needed.
The co-op family is growing
Farewell to ...
Hunter Ash is going to be a daddy! He and his wife, Datin, are expecting their first child this October. Clent Flowers and his wife, Cortney, are expecting their third baby boy to arrive later this year.
Wedding Bells
Nicole and Brent Cothern got married February 20.
John Robinson and Dawna are now married!
Beth and Chris Driver tied the knot in March. 7
Andy Lawrence retired May 6 after 43 years of service. We wish him a very happy retirement!
Submitted by Christy Tuckey
Easy Banana Nut Bread Makes one 9 1/2 x 5" loaf Ingredients 8 tablespoons butter, softened 1 cup sugar 2 beaten eggs 3 mashed bananas 1/2 teaspoon salt 1 teaspoon baking soda 1/4 teaspoon vanilla extract 1 1/4 cups all-purpose flour 1/2 cup walnuts
Instructions Cream together the butter and sugar. Stir in eggs and bananas. Then, slowly mix in salt, baking soda, vanilla and flour. Fold in walnuts. Pour in a greased loaf pan and bake at 350 degrees for 40 to 50 minutes.
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