Sharing our appreciation and progress with members
88th Annual Meeting and Member Appreciation Day Report
by General Manager Steve Stroshane
Employees and directors of Polk-Burnett Electric Cooperative welcomed 650 members and guests to the Centuria office Friday, June 5, for Member Appreciation Day and our 88th Annual Meeting. The day began at 11 a.m. with food, fun and giveaways for all ages, including bounce houses, lunch and wagon rides. Board President Ed Gullickson called the meeting to order at 1:30 p.m.
We enjoy meeting our members, sharing our appreciation for you and talking with you about co-op performance, especially our mission to keep the lights on with efficiency and extraordinary service. I'd like to thank all who attended and share meeting highlights.
Some of the projects we’re most proud of are the new Cedar Lake Substation, local solar to benefit co-op members and our conversion to underground power lines. Today, we have more miles of underground line than overhead.
Polk-Burnett delivers power to more than 22,000 electric services across 3,500 miles of power line; about 2,000 are underground and 1,500 are overhead. The co-op installed 274 new services in 2025 and invested $6 million to maintain and upgrade the electric system.
Cedar Lake Substation, a significant milestone for Polk-Burnett and our members, became operational in December 2025. It’s our first new substation since 2001. It is important for modernizing the grid and will improve reliability in East Farmington, Somerset and Star Prairie areas. The substation investment of $2.2 million has new technology to restore outages faster and will save the co-op about $25,000 in operational costs per year.
Outage time is trending lower for co-op members over the past two decades, with an average of 40 to 50 minutes per year without power, when you factor out major event days. When I started at Polk-Burnett, the average was four hours without power.
When the lights go out, the co-op works to keep members informed through an outage map on the website, outage text alerts and Facebook.
We know your number one expectation is reliable power. We’re always working to reduce outages, restore power faster and communicate better.
At the conclusion of my report, I announced that members gave the co-op a score of 87 out of 100 on the 2025 American Customer Satisfaction Index. We’re proud of the level of service and satisfaction we provide.
Financial report
Heather Gerber, Polk-Burnett’s finance and accounting manager, reported the co-op has $116 million in electric assets, with electric operating revenue of $39 million and electric operating margins of $2.8 million.
Polk-Burnett does not own power plants; 56% of our revenue, just under $22 million, goes to purchase wholesale power from Dairyland Power, a La Crosse-based generation and transmission cooperative,” said Gerber. “We use 56 cents of every dollar we collect to purchase power on your behalf. The remaining 44 cents is what we work with to deliver power to our community.”
During her report, Gerber introduced Luck and Viola Solar. The new arrays connected to our local power grid in 2025. Each powers about 600 homes.
"Local solar benefits us by locking in our price of power at a fixed rate for the next 30 years," said Gerber. "This offsets power market costs and relieves high summer demand at our substations."
Gerber also explained the co-op’s rate history, and the difference between the daily availability charge and the kWh energy charge on member bills.
“The availability charge covers your share of the cost to build and maintain the electric grid and make sure electricity is available at your location,” she said. “The availability charge is higher in rural areas because there are fewer members to share these fixed costs.”
A 3% rate increase went into effect in July 2025. There will be no increase in 2026.
Gerber reminded members about co-op programs to help with electric bills, including SmartHub, EnergySense rebates, prepay, auto pay and budget billing. She said that Polk-Burnett gave $153,262 in rebates to help members boost energy efficiency and lower bills in 2025.
Board President Gullickson said the co-op also returned $2.2 million in Capital Credits to members in 2025.
Commitment to community report
Gullickson continued with the co-op’s commitment to community report, stating, “We work to improve our local quality of life not only with reliable power, but also with support for our community.”
In 2025, Polk-Burnett’s Operation Round Up donated $69,300 to 68 local nonprofits thanks to the generosity of members who round up their electric bill, said Gullickson.
“Polk-Burnett’s scholarship program also makes a difference,” he said. “The board approved $154,000 in scholarships for 77 students in the Class of 2026. Each recipient will receive $2,000 to continue their education, our largest scholarship amount ever!"
Members unanimously approved amendments on four bylaws: notice of director meetings, dispute resolution, joint membership and director election process.
During the Q&A forum, members asked co-op leaders about data centers, underground power lines, funding for EnergySense rebates and building near transformers.
