August 2026
Summer is a season of celebration. It brings backyard cookouts, family vacations, county fairs and long evenings spent making memories across the beautiful mid-Atlantic we call home.
For electric cooperatives, summer also marks another important tradition — annual meeting season.
Annual meetings may feel like community gatherings, complete with good food, fellowship and familiar faces. But beneath the hot dogs, lemonade and door prizes is something much more meaningful. These meetings display the best examples of the cooperative difference in action.
Unlike investor-owned utilities, cooperatives are governed by the people they serve. Each year, member-owners gather to learn about their cooperative, hear about the opportunities and challenges ahead, meet the employees who keep the lights on, and elect directors from their own communities. Those directors help guide decisions that shape the future of the co-op.
Even for co-ops that hold their annual meetings virtually, the goal is the same: engaging member-owners with their electric cooperative.
One of the great privileges of my job is attending annual meetings across our 16 member cooperatives and hosting the association’s own annual meeting, where directors and leaders from Virginia, Maryland and Delaware come together to celebrate accomplishments, share ideas and prepare for the future.
This year, as we gather in Cambridge, Md., we’ll celebrate another year of service and reflect on 90 years of electric cooperatives strengthening rural communities. While our industry continues to evolve, our mission remains unchanged: serving our members and improving the communities we call home.
Annual meetings remind us that co-ops are more than power providers; they are neighbors working together for the common good. Now that’s worth celebrating every summer.
Brian S. Mosier, President & CEO
Virginia, Maryland & Delaware Association of Electric Cooperatives