Umatilla Electric Cooperative General Manager and CEO Steve Eldrige will retire in early 2016 after nearly 44 years with UEC.
Eldrige made the announcement to about 350 attendees of the cooperative’s 78th Annual Meeting on Saturday, April 18.
“With UEC’s fortunes on the rise, with an engaged membership, an exceptional Board and wonderful employees, I am announcing the beginning of another new chapter in my life,” Eldrige said. “It has been my honor to serve the UEC membership for the past 43 years. You have entrusted me with work that mattered. Thank you.”
The exact timing of Eldrige’s retirement in early 2016 hasn’t been set. The UEC Board of Directors will hire a recruiting firm and conduct a national search for a new manager. The process may take most of 2015.
Eldrige was raised in Umatilla, studied electrical engineering at Oregon State, and was hired as the cooperative’s engineer when he graduated in 1972.
He joined Umatilla Electric as power demand was skyrocketing in the Boardman-to-Hermiston region. New corporate farms were turning the desert green with circles of potatoes and other crops. UEC rushed to build new substations designed by Eldrige’s engineering department. By 1975, he was given the new title of systems engineer.
In 1990, the UEC Board of Directors selected Eldrige to become the third general manager in the cooperative’s history, which was formed in the late 1930s. The previous general managers were Ray Woolley, hired in 1939, and Russ Dorran, promoted in 1971.
As general manager and CEO, Eldrige leads UEC in serving more than 14,000 accounts on about 2,200 miles of power lines in service territory from Boardman to the Blue Mountains. Under his guidance, UEC has grown from about $19.7 million in revenues in 1990 to an estimated $90 million in 2015.
By kilowatt-hours sold, UEC is projected by the end of 2015 to be the largest rural electric cooperative in Oregon, Washington, Idaho, California, Nevada, New Mexico, Arizona, Montana, Alaska and Hawaii.
UEC Board President Jeff Wenholz describes Eldrige as one the Northwest’s most respected utility managers and a powerful voice for both UEC and other public power utilities.
Most recently, a negotiated compromise with the Oregon Legislature on the Renewable Portfolio Standard is estimated to save UEC members $35 million in the coming two decades. “He’s an important and valuable asset to UEC and will be greatly missed,” Wenholz said.
Currently, Eldrige is chairman of Eastern Oregon Telecom, the Good Shepherd Health Care System Hospital Board, Ruralite Services Board and the Power Resources Cooperative Board. In addition, he serves on the boards of PNGC Power, Pacific Northwest Utilities Conference Committee and Lightspeed Networks.
