 |
Salt River
Electric
Community Creations
December 1997
About four years
ago, Chris’s Creations, a Bardstown company that makes various
kinds of home cabinets, was doing pretty well. The Chris of Chris’s
Creations, Chris Ballard, was considering expanding the plant, but
instead, with the help of the local Salt River Electric Cooperative,
he built a whole new plant, expanding from 35 to 60 employees and
from 15,000 square feet to 44,000 square feet. He added automation,
and generally “built a state-of-the-art woodworking facility.”
The Salt River
co-op was especially helpful, Ballard says, at helping nail down
some government loans that made the project possible. “They helped
me cut through a lot of government stuff that was foreign to me,”
says Ballard.
Nicky Rapier,
director of business development at Salt River, says he’s glad to
be able to help. “They’re skilled at making cabinets,” says
Rapier. “They don’t have time to know what programs are
available and to fool with the government and red tape. We fool with
the government every day, and we can be a buffer between these local
business people and the state.”
Rapier spends his
days staying in contact with public officials and local business
people, learning what each needs and serving as a resource to help
create jobs, and to help local businesses succeed. Rapier figures
that since he began his job about five years ago, the Salt River
co-op has helped in the creation of some 100 new jobs in its
communities, largely through expansion of existing businesses. “We
hope to do even more,” says Rapier.
Salt River
Electric Cooperative, the local user-owned, not-for-profit utility
that provides electricity to 31,000 homes and businesses in 10
counties south of Louisville, focuses on community development as a
way of using its expertise to help improve the Salt River area
economy for everyone.
“We can be a
powerful resource for these smaller businesses, and make a
difference in the community,” says Larry Hicks, general manager at
the Salt River co-op. “We do a number of things very well, and
using that knowledge to help the local economy is good for those
businesses, it’s good for the co-op, and it’s good for our
consumers.”
Salt River’s
general involvement in community development is leading to other
efficiencies in the area. Rapier notes that as a result of working
closely with some of Salt River’s larger business customers, the
co-op has been able to design special rates, such as interruptible
rates that charge businesses less in return for being able to reduce
their power on an hour’s notice. He also cites the co-op’s role
in creating a county master plan for water distribution, and a test
now under way with Nelson County, in which trash collection bills
are being sent as part of the Salt River Electric Co-op bills,
creating a number of efficiencies, including reducing the number of
bills that customers have to mail back.
“You can’t
always know what kind of benefits are going to result when you get
involved in making these kinds of community development contacts,”
says Napier. “We’ve discovered a whole new world of
opportunities.”-Paul Wesslund |
