The rising costs of material supplies, a down turning economy, wars on foreign land, drought, hurricanes, pandemic, and election cycles all mixed over the past few years has taken a toll on everyone, including Clarke Electric.
Simple material like poles, wire and transformers have been difficult to secure. Capital expense items such as utility vehicles have a 60-month lead time. The inability to get materials and supplies as needed has caused delays with our work plans.
At this time, we are nearly finished securing another long-term contract with our power provider, Central Iowa Power Cooperative (CIPCO), to ensure we may continue to provide safe, reliable and affordable electricity for our member-consumers.
As the cooperative works to put a budget in place for 2023 and forecast our needs for the next several years, we are seeing a trend of increasing costs, while growth in member-consumers averages 50 members per year and kWh sales are stable. In the environment we are currently navigating, we don’t expect to see these conditions change.