Cobb EMC members will assemble Saturday for the first membership meeting in three years since a customer-filed lawsuit against the Marietta-based cooperative stalled the annual gathering.
Unhappy EMC members say today's meeting is their opportunity to begin the process of overhauling the company’s polices and procedures and ultimately installing new leaders.
A group of customers sued the co-op in 2007 alleging that former CEO Dwight Brown and other co-op leaders had unjustly benefited by setting up a separate for-profit company and siphoning co-op assets to it. As part of the 2008 settlement Brown retired in February and is currently under indictment for charges stemming from the lawsuit. Longtime EMC executive Chip Nelson was selected as Brown's replacement in July.
Members will vote on two proposed changes to the company’s bylaws, including whether to allow members to vote by mail in future board of directors elections and whether to limit directors’ compensation. Board member elections, which also were suspended with the ongoing litigation from the 2007 lawsuit, will be held in three rounds, beginning in November.
The mail-in ballot provision has been a hot topic in the months leading up to Saturday’s meeting with both the EMC and customer reform groups hoping to unseat the current board members. Reformers say the mail-in ballots would give the 10 incumbent board members an unfair advantage since the co-op could use unlimited EMC resources to promote its candidates. The EMC says the mail-in ballots will allow more members to participate in company decision-making.
A non-profit, customer-owned electric co-op, Cobb EMC serves about 180,000 customers, mostly in Atlanta’s northwest suburbs. The company has conducted in-person meetings for the last 71 years. Turnout at those meetings has averaged between 300 members and 600 members, said EMC spokesman Sam Kelly.
"We don't think that 300 or 400 different people are enough to make decision on the issues that will be decided," Kelly said. "We have a new CEO, it's a new day here at Cobb EMC and the board thinks it's time to do this."
The explanation doesn’t convince reform group members, some of them original plaintiffs in the 2007 lawsuit.
“This mail-in ballot is a weaselly way for the board to further entrench themselves in their positions,” said Tripper Sharp, one of the original plaintiffs and member of the Cobb EMC Owners Association reform group. Sharp joined about 20 members of the Owners Association in a rally across from EMC headquarters on Friday, holding “vote no” and “stop the corruption” signs. Across the street, about the same number of EMC employees — on their lunch breaks, Kelly said— countered with a “vote yes” rally about the mail-in provision.
“They could use EMC resources, our dollars, to canvass neighborhoods and convince voters to vote for their candidates on these ballots,” Sharp said. “Members need to ask if it’s that [the EMC incumbent board members] are trying to keep the status quo.”
The second bylaw provision up for decision Saturday is whether to end retirement benefits for future board members. Directors are currently paid $600 for attending board meetings, $500 for committee meetings, and $400 for professional workshops, along with health insurance and a $30,000 in life insurance that decreases over time. Directors also receive $1,100 per month in retirement compensation for 16 years after they have retired from the board and reached age 65, regardless of the term they serve on the board.
Saturday’s member meeting begins at 10:15 a.m. at Piedmont Church at 570 Piedmont Road, Marietta. Registration begins at 8 a.m. and voting runs from 12:30 p.m. to 5 p.m. Voting results will be announced after voting ends. One customer per account will be allowed to cast a vote.
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