Still growing, still yours

The new year is the time for fresh starts, new habits and goalset­ting for many of us. It’s also a time I use to reflect on life—areas where I can improve and the things for which I’m most grate­ful. It’s impor­tant for me to reflect, because if you for­get where you came from, it’s hard to see where you’ve been and where you’re going. The same holds true for pro­vid­ing a strate­gic direc­tion for your co-op.

I start­ed work­ing as the pur­chas­ing agent here over 33 years ago. The mate­ri­als we pur­chased, orga­nized and loaded on trucks were the tools need­ed to con­struct the elec­tri­cal designs used to pro­vide mem­bers with reli­able ser­vice. Those mate­ri­als have improved over the years, using tech­nol­o­gy to pro­vide more reli­able ser­vice. But at our core, that’s been the goal all along: look­ing out for you as a depend­able neigh­bor that improves your qual­i­ty of life.

As we begin our 85th year, I’d like to remind you of where we start­ed and share the excit­ing things that are com­ing this year. It began when 553 neigh­bors joined togeth­er to form York Elec­tric to bring pow­er to our rur­al com­mu­ni­ties. Then, the co-op served most­ly farm­ers and fam­i­lies. Because of the growth we’ve seen in our area and in our state, we now serve more hous­es, busi­ness­es, advanced man­u­fac­tur­ing and schools. In 2026, we antic­i­pate anoth­er 1,500 new res­i­den­tial ser­vices and two large pow­er users, includ­ing Lake Wylie High School and a QTS data cen­ter.

We are now the 5th largest co-op in the state, serv­ing over 72,000 mem­bers. Before, all dis­tri­b­u­tion lines were over­head. Now, more than half of our ser­vice lines are under­ground, and we’re work­ing on bury­ing more around Kings Moun­tain Nation­al Mil­i­tary Park and Mel­rose sub­di­vi­sion. These upgrades help mit­i­gate out­age risks from weath­er con­di­tions, fall­en trees and wildlife.

Each year, we under­go new ini­tia­tives to strength­en our posi­tion as your trust­ed ener­gy advi­sor, just as we have since our begin­ning. Rest assured, your co-op will always be proac­tive to pre­vent out­ages and install equip­ment to help restore ser­vices as quick­ly as pos­si­ble when they occur. In 2026, we are installing our first auto­mat­ed dis­tri­b­u­tion sys­tem to auto­mat­i­cal­ly restore pow­er to a por­tion of the grid. In an out­age sit­u­a­tion, this sys­tem will iso­late the area where dam­age has occurred and restore pow­er to the unaf­fect­ed areas with­in a mat­ter of min­utes. Also, this year, work con­tin­ues with the build-out of our enhanced meter­ing sys­tem. These new meters auto­mat­i­cal­ly iden­ti­fy areas affect­ed by out­ages before the first call comes into the office, and they pin­point usage trends, help­ing mem­bers to avoid high bills.

While 2026 brings new growth and change, these projects reit­er­ate the strong foun­da­tion that dif­fer­en­ti­ates your co-op from oth­er util­i­ties. It was this way when we began and remains stead­fast now, 85 years lat­er. At York Elec­tric, we are most grate­ful for you, our mem­bers. We look for­ward to a suc­cess­ful 2026, serv­ing you with excel­lence as a trust­ed neigh­bor, part­ner and friend.