Despite what some local news outlets reported on January 30th, OEC did not receive a $12.9 million grant to improve and expand rural electric infrastructure and smart grid technology. The real fact is that OEC received a loan for that amount from Rural Utilities Service (RUS), a division of the USDA. We did not receive any “free” money, as the word grant implies.
Oconto Electric has utilized low-interest loans through RUS for many years. Loan funds are used to complete ongoing work on our system. RUS is one of three loan sources that OEC uses, always seeking the best interest rates to keep costs as low as possible for our members.
Lastly, OEC will not be getting into broadband as one news article implied.
For additional questions concerning this announcement, please contact the office to speak with the CEO Byron Nolde, 920-846-2816.
Oconto Electric Cooperative (OEC) has two crop land parcels totaling approximately 30 tillable acres, available for rent beginning Spring 2023.
Parcel Locations: Section 24, T28N, R19 E. USDA map shows 6.26 acres and 23.42 acres are located along Chestnut Rd, in Oconto Falls.
Bidding requirements: Bids must be submitted for a 5-year agreement (2023, 2024, 2025, 2026, 2027). Each year’s rent is due no later than March 1st of that year. Sealed bids may be mailed to Attention: Byron Nolde, CEO, or dropped off at OEC, 7479 REA Rd, PO Box 168, Oconto Falls, WI 54154.
Deadline: 4:00 p.m. Friday, January 27th, 2023. OEC reserves the right to refuse any and all bids.
OCONTO FALLS – Oconto Electric Cooperative’s RadioShack wants to bring to your attention and announce that we have made the decision to sell our retail business. Effective June 11, a new Cellcom store will open next door to our current location at Highland Square Mall. We are pleased that we are placing the business in the very capable hands of the new owners who currently own three other Cellcom locations. We know you will continue to receive the best service available as the Owners/Operators have more than 28 years of combined hands on experience.
June 10 will be our last day as a Cellcom agent, but our RadioShack store will remain open through July 27.
It has been a pleasure to serve this community for over two decades. “OEC has decided to put focus on our core business and emerging technologies that are directly related to our industry,” said Robin Banaszynski, OEC manager of member services.
We wish to thank you for your patronage over the past 23 years. As we close we would like for you to know how much we appreciate your business and support.
RadioShack is located in the Highland Square Mall, 323 E Highland Drive, Oconto Falls, WI.
It’s the trip of a lifetime for sons and daughters of co-op members.
APPLY TODAY!
NRECA Youth Tour of Washington, D.C.
June 17-22, 2022
Oconto Electric is pleased to choose one delegate to represent our local co-op at the National Rural Electric Cooperative Association (NRECA) Youth Tour in Washington, D.C. The trip is hosted by NRECA and all expenses are paid by Oconto Electric, according to our cooperative principles to support youth and community.
Any current high school sophomore or junior whose parent or guardian is a residential member of Oconto Electric Cooperative is eligible. (Residential is defined as having the primary residence within OEC’s service territory.)
Applications must be submitted on or before December 17, 2021. Applications received after December 17, 2021, will not be considered.
Government-in-Action Youth Tour
Visiting a place like Washington, D.C., might sound like a far-away dream for high school students who grow up in rural Wisconsin. But every year, several cooperative students are given the opportunity to travel to the capital for an intensive weeklong tour—and it doesn’t cost them a dime.
In June, the Wisconsin Government-in-Action Youth Tour, sponsored by the state’s rural electric cooperatives in conjunction with the National Rural Electric Cooperative Association, sends select students on an all-expense-paid trip to the nation’s capital. In Washington, tour participants get to see with their own eyes, sights many have only experienced in history books or on television.
In addition to visiting monuments, museums, and historical sites that would be part of any standard tour, the students also fulfill the goal of then U.S. Sen. Lyndon Johnson, who inspired the Youth Tour in 1957, for young people to “actually see what the flag stands for and represents.”
Tour participants get to meet their Members of Congress, hear inspirational speakers, and interact with other Youth Tour participants from across the country. Additionally, Wisconsin students have the chance to witness in the wreath-laying ceremony at Arlington National Cemetery, see the Sunset Parade at the Iwo Jima War Memorial, and tour the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives chambers.
During the intense week on the go—traveling, eating and touring together—many of the Youth Tour participants form fast friendships that continue after they return home. Inspired by their trip, many Youth Tour alumni have gone on to become co-op leaders or perform other public service. Ask almost any of the alumni about their experience, and they will describe it as “the trip of a lifetime.”
Oconto Electric Cooperative (OEC) will be hosting a public information meeting to provide the public with information about the proposed drawdown of the Machickanee Flowage. The meeting will be held on June 15, 2021, 1 PM, at the Stiles Town Hall, located at 5718 Watercrest Road, Lena, WI 54139.
OEC is planning a temporary five-foot drawdown at the Machickanee Flowage upstream of the Stiles Hydroelectric Project (Project). The purpose of the drawdown is management of aquatic invasive species, excessive plant growth, and consolidation of flowage substrate for the purpose of improvements to navigation.
The drawdown is scheduled to begin the week of July 5, 2021, weather dependent and following regulatory approval. The water level of the flowage will be lowered over approximately 10 to 14 days at an average rate of 3 to 6 inches per day (depending on rainfall). Once the maximum drawdown of five feet is reached, the water level will be maintained at this level for approximately 70 days. Upon drawdown completion, the flowage will be refilled over approximately 10 days to a level within the normal operational range. The total duration of the project is planned for approximately three months.
Public foot traffic in the exposed areas may pose a public safety risk. The public is asked to stay away from the exposed river/flowage bed. Additionally, picking items off the bed of the river, and disturbing sediment may require permits from the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources. The public boat landing will be closed until the flowage is returned to normal water levels.
Please contact OEC at 920-846-2816 if you have any questions about this project.
Community Change is a project of Oconto Electric Cooperative. Members can sign up to have their electric bills rounded up to the next whole dollar, with the extra money going into the Community Change fund. In addition, due to the generosity of the former Bay Lakes Cooperative, Community Change has additional funding available for this special grant. To be considered, an organization should show through this grant application how an innovative idea for funding could provide far-reaching enhancement for a neighborhood or community. Grant(s) will be awarded to projects being done in the footprint of the former Bay Lakes territory and the current Oconto Electric service territory. Request not to exceed $4,000 (grant total could be split based on the nature and scope of applications received). Grant application deadline is March 1, 2021.
Have you fallen on hard times because of the coronavirus? Trying to keep up with the bills and other finances can be really stressful.
There are local county offices and other agencies that may be able to help you with financial assistance.
Oconto County DHHS 920-834-7000 Shawano County DHS 715-526-4740 Marinette County HHS 715-732-7740 Menominee County HHSD 715-799-3861 St. Vincent de Paul 920-604-2320 Salvation Army 920-887-5352
Oconto Falls, WI; October 4, 2019 –October is National Cooperative Month, what a great time for Oconto Electric Cooperative (OEC) employees to demonstrate Co-op principle number seven: commitment to community.
OEC employees worked all year to raise $9,500. CoBank, one of the co-op’s lenders, also donated $7,500 as part of its Sharing Success Matching Grant program.
Employees were able to present $8,500 to Oconto Falls Law Enforcement. They recently obtained an armored vehicle through the US Military at no cost. The armored vehicle is being funded strictly through fundraising and grants, at no cost to the local tax payers. The plan is that all local departments can utilize the armored vehicle as a rescue vehicle in the event that there is a victim or downed officer. At this time, there is no such vehicle in Oconto County. If there is a situation, they currently depend on Marinette or Brown County for assistance.
Oconto County Commission on Aging, Inc. also received $8,500. They have been operating their Oconto County Elderly Nutrition Program (Meals on Wheels) since 1980. Good nutrition is critical to good health. Poor nutrition is the greatest threat to an older adult’s independence. This program is funded by state and federal grants and contributions from participants. The funds they were given are going towards a new delivery van.
Since 2004, OEC employees have awarded $113,000 to charities and organizations.
Ruth Carriveau, Executive Director of Oconto County Commission on Aging, Inc., and Oconto Falls Police Chief Brad accept money from Oconto Electric employees.
OEC Linemen Ron Friedman, Ben Wilcox and line superintendent Jack Pardy headed to Florida on Monday, Sept. 11 to help restore power lost during Hurricane Irma.
OEC Assists with Hurricane Irma Restoration Relief convoy headed south
Oconto Falls, Wis. (September 12, 2017)— September 11, Oconto Electric Cooperative (OEC) linemen Ron Friedman and Ben Wilcox along with line superintendent Jack Pardy headed to Clay Electric Cooperative, headquartered in Keystone Heights, Florida, northeast of Gainesville to assist in restoration efforts due to Hurricane Irma. As of Tuesday morning, Clay Electric estimated that 90 percent of its system was without power.
OEC met up with volunteer line crews from 18 Wisconsin electric cooperatives–more than 50 employees–to join in Florida’s massive recovery effort, helping rebuild shattered electric systems in the wake of Hurricane Irma’s devastation. Vehicles were dispatched, including bucket trucks, pole-hauling trailers, and digging equipment. OEC took a bucket truck, skid steer and pickup truck.
The Florida Electric Cooperatives Association, a statewide trade group, put out a call for help last Thursday, anticipating Irma’s Sunday morning landfall and the huge storm’s potential to simultaneously batter the entire state.
Line superintendents from Wisconsin cooperatives got word of the request at a previously scheduled meeting in Stevens Point and immediately began planning their response, assessing availability of workers and equipment.
Those preparations were completed during a busy weekend. Early Monday morning, co-op vehicles began departing from local headquarters across the state from assembly points at Eau Claire, Oakdale, Portage, and Janesville. At least three multi-co-op convoys planned to reach Ste. Genevieve, Missouri by Monday night, and Hattiesburg, Mississippi by Tuesday night, arriving in Florida by late Wednesday afternoon.
Participating co-ops traveling southward include Adams-Columbia, Barron, Bayfield, Central Wisconsin, and Clark Electric Cooperatives, Dairyland Power Cooperative, Dunn and Eau Claire Energy Cooperatives, Oakdale and Oconto Electric Cooperatives, Pierce Pepin Cooperative Services, Price and Richland Electric Cooperatives, Riverland, Rock, and Scenic Rivers Energy Cooperatives, and Taylor and Vernon Electric Cooperatives.
The relief mission is similar to assistance rendered by Wisconsin co-ops 12 years ago following Hurricane Katrina. Personnel from 14 Wisconsin electric cooperatives were dispatched over a four-week period to Louisiana on a rotating basis, helping to rebuild a local co-op distribution system that had been almost totally destroyed.
It’s also similar—on a larger scale—to the ROPE (restoration of power in an emergency) program in which Wisconsin co-ops help each other shorten recovery times when severe weather damages local electric systems.
On three previous occasions since this past spring, ten Wisconsin co-ops have loaned out line crews in ROPE deployments to help others speed up rebuilding of storm-damaged systems. OEC was one of those co-ops that called for help after the big windstorm on June 11.
OEC is a member-owned, not-for-profit, generation & distribution cooperative headquartered in Oconto Falls, Wisconsin. In 1937, the cooperative was formed to serve electricity in rural northeast Wisconsin. Currently OEC serves more than 9,600 members throughout Oconto, Marinette, and small portions of Shawano County.
Any questions please contact Katie Jagiello at kjagiello@rkm.ca1.myftpupload.com or call (920) 846-2816.
