What Do You Receive as a Member?
Training
NWPPA is a premier workforce development and education provider for public power in the Northwest. Each year NWPPA trains thousands of employees and board members offering over 250 training events, workshops, and conferences. The Association keeps abreast of its member training needs through a member-driven committee structure. Courses are offered in most functional utility operation areas, including engineering, operations, customer service, accounting, and leadership. Webinars are offered for members throughout the year covering current events and issues in the utility industry. In addition, NWPPA offers board and management training to meet the demands of operating a utility on behalf of a utility’s constituency. NWPPA’s four major conferences, issue forums, and Annual Meeting are recognized as some of the best topical and timely events in support of public power offered anywhere in the country.
Committees and Task Forces
Run by members, each of our committees and task forces covers a specific topic area. NWPPA’s committees, and roundtables are a key components of your utility’s employee succession plan. These groups offer members an opportunity to participate in the development of training and new services and products; members also share ideas and experiences. Where better to learn about working with diverse groups of people, broadening horizons with outside industry-related committee assignments, learning skills chairing committees, and contributing something back to the industry? Current committees are: Government Relations; Information Technology; Power Supply; Customer Service, Credit and Collections; Power Supply; Administrative Assistant; Alaska Utility Conference; Engineering & Operations; and Northwest Communication & Energy Innovations. Task Forces include the Environmental Task Force.
Publications
Members receive the region’s only industry-specific monthly magazine. The Bulletin is a full-color magazine packed with industry- and member-related features, rotating topic-specific columns, updates, personnel changes, job opportunities, and news about NWPPA events. NWPPA also produces the annual Northwest Electric Utility Directory. It is a comprehensive guide that includes important information about utilities in the region; Associate Members listings, including a Products and Services Guide; government agencies; and energy-related trade associations. The Association publishes an electronic newsletter, The Line, with up-to-date information about the utility industry delivered right to your inbox every week.
Federal Legislative Representation and Coordination
While statewide organizations focus on legislative efforts affecting their respective states, NWPPA represents its members on regional issues at the federal level. We employ a local and federal lobbyist to represent our members’ interests in Washington, D.C., working closely with NWPPA’s Government Relations Committee. We sponsor an annual face-to-face trip to Washington, D.C., and we hold meetings with association leaders to coordinate federal legislative activities. Each year the membership passes resolutions which become NWPPA’s membership position on energy issues affecting the region and the industry. These public power resolutions communicate our members’ positions to legislators and other important audiences and interest groups. As a member, you have the opportunity to propose resolutions and vote on these important resolutions.
NWPPA utility members have full access to a variety of issue alerts, reference materials, and related resources to help them with materials to distribute to their customers and legislators on key public power issues.
Surveys
Information is power, and in today’s environment having the right information is critical to success. The Association gathers information and distributes the aggregated results to members by conducting annual wage and benefit surveys of its membership.
Utility Membership Investment
Membership investment is calculated by a formula based on your system’s retail kilowatt-hour sales, number of active meters, and the number of employees at your utility. If you would like to know more about NWPPA utility membership, or receive a membership calculation, email us at nwppa@nwppa.org, call (360) 254-0109, or write to us at 9817 NE 54th St., Ste. 200, Vancouver, WA 98662-6064.
Cooperative Programs to Meet Specific Member Needs
NWPPA provides services for a fee to groups of utilities that want to work cooperatively on certain programs. These service-for-fee programs include the NWPPA Labor & Employee Relations Group, a group comprised of labor relations experts of both public and private utilities. They meet to discuss employee/management issues in the workplace.
