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Bring Co-op Power to Your Community

CO-OP POWER SUPPORT FOR BUILDING COMMUNITY-OWNED GREEN ENERGY AND GREEN JOBS IN YOUR COMMUNITY

Co-op Power supports groups of dedicated people in a local community to really make a difference, rather than reinventing the wheel, getting lost, doing lots of clerical work, and getting stuck only doing public education. If you're ready to build sustainable energy in your community, Co-op Power's resources could save you three years and more than $150,000 in development costs. You bring the ideas – wind turbines, biofuel plants, green jobs – we'll help you make them a reality. When you work with Co-op Power you begin with an experienced team of consultants and support staff behind you right from the start so you can invest your time in the things that no one else can do – leading the community planning, decision making, and support that matter most.

Project Development and Project Financing

Co-op Power staff and volunteers can assist you with strategic planning, feasibility analysis, business planning, grant fundraising, and business development for your community-owned green jobs and green energy projects.

You can sign up people to be members of Co-op Power and ask them to direct 75% of their equity contribution to support the development of energy projects you are working on. Member equity can be used as an equity investment in your project or as a loan to your project once the Local Organizing Council and Co-op Power Board of Directors have signed off on your project. This project financing tool is a useful way to build direct community ownership in your project without having to go through the time and expense to set up a separate cooperative with a new line of products and services. It's the most valuable tool Co-op Power has to offer. The Co-op Power network of energy groups brings valuable resources, sharing business plans, market research, consulting leads, and more.

Outreach and Education Efforts

Co-op Power can provide a wide range of services to support your education and outreach efforts. Co-op Power can help you with your events – providing speakers, zero waste event resources and support for successful participatory event organizing. Materials on a wide range of subjects are available to support your education efforts. Promotional materials for Co-op Power products and services can be tailored to meet your needs. Co-op Power can also provide office support with a tollfree number, a webpage on our website for your Local Organizing Council or Energy project, a phone bank for holding phone-a-thons. The Co-op Power network of energy groups brings valuable resources, sharing outreach and education materials, links to speakers, programs, funding sources, and more.

You can also participate in Co-op Power’s Outreach and Education events. You can set up Co-op Power tables at your events. You can join Co-op Power's tables at regional conferences like NOFA, NESEA, Home Shows, Garlic and Arts Festivals, Solar Fest, and other regional gatherings. Co-op Power also hosts a regional Sustainable Energy Summit each spring. The next Summit will be May 1-2, 2009 at UMass in Amherst. You can use this event to help get the word about about your projects and programs.

Online Resources

You can also Co-op Power's online services for database management (SugarCRM), accounting (quick books), project management (base camp), online surveys (survey monkey), campaign monitor (bulk email services), eventbrite (event registration), online products and services ordering, grantstation (fundraising research) and paypal (secure online credit card payment processing). These resources cut way down on the clerical work required to keep your efforts moving along and make it easier to get your work done. These are worth more than $1,000 a year in annual subscription fees.

Leadership Development and Networking

We can learn so much from the other efforts taking place around the region. Co-op Power leadership training and networking events make sure you're not reinventing the wheel. We'll share business plans, funding resources, ideas, and networks and learn new skills to move our energy projects along. Every 3-4 months we have a regional training for people who are providing leadership for energy groups in their communities. We have a rigorous curriculum that includes training on sustainability, justice, deep democracy, community organizing, community-based business development, and building a multi-racial, multi-class movement. Email Lynn Benander at This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it if you'd like to be invited to the next training program!

Funding

From time to time, Co-op Power may be able to help you pay for copying/printing, travel, bulk mailings/emailing, data entry, and event registration expenses over the next couple years. We plan to have have more significant funding in a couple years.


To access these resources, contact Lynn Benander at Co-op Power ( This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it or 877-266-7543)

Co-op Power's Regional Structure

If you're interested in becoming more involved in Co-op Power, you can read below about the role of organizing councils and how you could become one.

Co-op Power, as a decentralized network of local organizations, has Local Organizing Councils each playing the lead role in their regions. Their primary responsibility is to organize and educate people in their region and to facilitate the development of one or more community-owned, community-scale, clean energy businesses. We will have one member of the Co-op Power board serve on each Local Organizing Council’s board and one member the Local Organizing Council’s board serve on the Co-op Power board. Each representative has veto power and can stop something within specific guidelines. In this way, locals work autonomously, yet in coordination with each other.

Role of Co-op Power Staff and Board

  • Support local organizing councils
  • Work through the Solar Store in your region (if you have one and they're willing) to provide local access to Co-op Power's member services or find another way to provide member services in the region
  • Provide education and outreach materials, staff, trainers, presenters
  • Develop resources to build community-scale clean energy projects (business plans, capital models, financing, etc.)
  • Provide access to online tools for local use
  • Provide infrastructure for local organizing councils and support members in the region including a database, financial management, and management services
  • Process orders for products and services/provide customer service
  • Negotiate bulk purchasing agreements with vendors
  • Maintain and develop online tools for decentralized local involvement

Role of Local Organizing Councils

  • Develop a locally-owned, community-scale sustainable energy project
  • Engage in Outreach and Membership Development
  • Hold Education and Energy Forums
  • Engage in Participatory Sustainable Energy Planning
  • Engage in Public Policy Advocacy
  • Nominate candidates to the Local Organizing Council’s Co-op Power Board seat and the at-large seats on the Co-op Power Board
  • Elect members to the board of your locally-owned, community-scale sustainable energy businesses
  • Develop a local distribution system for Co-op Power products
  • Provide a free Co-op Power office space in a central location

Vision Statement

Co-op Power is building a strong political, economic and social force for transitioning our communities to a sustainable way of life – sustainable energy, transportation, land use, waste management, housing, food, etc – based on an earth reverent & just sharing of resources in our communities.

Mission Statement

Co-op Power is building a sustainable and just energy future in the Northeast.

Goals

In the next ten years, Co-op Power will:

· Expand membership in the Northeast region. Collaborate with resilient, community-building groups and projects to achieve our mission. Expand the scale of our vision of “community” – recognize the need for interdependence and cooperation beyond the town and county.

· Support new, community-owned, community-scale renewable energy projects (like Northeast Biodiesel) with stakeholder support and in a manner that builds trust. We want to do this as quickly as possible because we have an urgent need to curb climate change, reduce our reliance on foreign oil, and become more self-sufficient. Build diverse and regionally appropriate renewable energy projects. Expedite, optimize, and maximize shared local access to capital & expertise for building community owned, community scale clean energy resources through leverage of prior success. Maximize & facilitate capitalization of local energy resources. Re-localize – move from an import economy to increasingly sustainable local economies connected to a vibrant network of other local economies.

· Bring voice & image to energy planning, provision, and policy.

Assumptions and Guiding Principles

· URGENCY – There is a sense of urgency that the development process should not encumber goals but enable these goals. To move forth urgently & quickly while at the same time keeping our eyes open so that we don’t stumble. You can’t climb Everest in a day.

· LOCAL CONTROL AND REGIONAL ACCOUNTABILITY – WIN/WIN -There is a strong role for local oversight and control of local generation resources, and accountability to the whole. Autonomy and collaboration. Local groups will decide how much they want to share risks and assets and consequently decision-making or how much they’d like to not share risks & assets and have more independence in decision making. We’re a bioregion known as the Northeast as a whole, optimizing development of renewable energy resources.

· STRONG ETHICAL BASE – Communication and decisions are transparent (open, clear, easily understood) built on mutual respect, honesty, & trust.

· EFFICIENCY AND LEVERAGE – We will leverage combined resources to optimally site and build renewable energy projects. We’ll keep the money working hard.

The advantages of forming a federation with other local groups working to develop clean energy resources:

· Stability; Access to a pool for sharing risk among clean energy business ventures

· Resources for clean energy business development; Greater access to investment dollars for projects; Access to existing structure for raising community capital; Access to existing expertise in business development

· Access to strong membership structure with strong benefits package; More products and services at better prices for people in our region

· Timing; Ability to get started right away with member development and sustainable energy business development

· Cost Efficiency; Ability to build on Co-op Power’s resources rather than spending the time and money to develop them ourselves

How to become a Co-op Power Local Organizing Council

Here is the process to follow to become a Local Organizing Council and develop community-owned, community-scale sustainable energy resources for your community.

Step #1) Decide you want to become a Co-op Power Local Organizing Council. Have a group of 20 Co-op Power members in your area send in a letter of interest to the Co-op Power Staff and Board. Be sure to include each of the areas described in the Local Organizing Committee Letter of Interest Guidelines. If you don't have 20 members, you can also include people who agree to join Co-op Power individually if the group is accepted by the Board as a Local Organizing Council. You can define your Local Organizing Council in any way you wish, with whatever geographic or interest group you choose.

Step #2) Getting to know each other. To build a strong relationship between the Co-op Power Board and the Local Organizing Council applicant, each group appoints one of its own members to join the governing group of the other as an advisor. Advisors can participate in meetings via conference call or in-person. Online exchanges are also encouraged.

Step #3) Decision Time. After three to six months the Co-op Power Board decides whether to accept the Local Organizing Council applicant based on criteria established by the Co-op Power members. If accepted, the Local Organizing Council advisor to the Co-op Power board will continue service until the next Co-op Power board election, when a voting position with veto power will be created for the Local Organizing Council on the Co-op Power board; the Co-op Power board member will have a veto holding seat on their Local Organizing Council.

Step #4) Getting the Collaboration Started. The Local Organizing Council will begin (or continue) carrying out the responsibilities of a Local Organizing Council in their region and you'll meet with Co-op Power staff to agree on how to access resources from the Co-op Power board and staff. The local Solar Store will provide customer service support for Co-op Power Members in the region or, if one doesn't exist within 30 miles, we'll work together to start one or we'll co-hire a quarter time local staff person to do sales and outreach in the region. Co-op Power will extend the products and services it offers members to that region where appropriate and possible. The Local Organizing Council will engage their community in a clean energy participatory planning process to reduce your region’s energy use; build more local, clean energy resources; and re-localize your economy. You'll also decide what Sustainable Energy Business Development Project is most needed and appropriate for their community (if not completed already) and then engage in a local energy business development project.

Step #5) Membership Development. The Local Organizing Council will recruit people to join Co-op Power. They will recruit local vendors to “Sweeten the Pot” to encourage members to join (restaurant and book store discounts, food co-op discounts, hot tub discounts, massages, etc). They will hold outreach meetings, table at events, run training programs, and run stories in local newspapers and newsletters encouraging people to join Co-op Power and support the work of the Local Organizing Council. They will develop a list of more than 300 people interested in building a sustainable and just energy future for their region and sign on more than 50 (total) Co-op Power members. 75% of the member equity raised by the Local Organizing Council will be held in trust to invest in their Sustainable Energy Project. 25% of the member equity they raise will be used to provide Products and Services to Co-op Power members, support Co-op Power Member Development and Governance activities, and to build Co-op Power’s capacity to support Project Development regionally. Once 50 members have been recruited who support a specific project, the Local Organizing Council can submit a Project Application to build a locally-owned sustainable energy business in their community.

Step #6) Project Letter of Interest. The Local Organizing Council sends a Project Letter of Interest to Co-op Power Staff and Board ( This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it or 324 Wells Street, Greenfield MA 01301). Be sure to include each of the areas described in the Project Letter of Interest Guidelines. Staff will coach applicants to help prepare their Project Letter of Interest for presentation to the Co-op Power Board. Please call to confirm your letter has been received.

Step #7) Review Process. Co-op Power Staff send the application to a Board-Appointed Advisory Group for review. The Advisory Group produces a report that advises the board on how well this project meets each of the Member-Adopted Criteria.

Step #8) Decision Making. The Advisory Group sends their report into the Co-op Power Board. The Co-op Power Board decides if the project meets the Member-Adopted Criteria and if Co-op Power has the capacity to adequately support the project and when. If adopted, the Board will instruct the Co-op Power Manager to negotiate a Project Agreement with the Founding Project Board of Directors that will outline roles, responsibilities, action plans, timelines, and budget for Project Development.

Step #9) Business Planning and Development. With support from Co-op Power, the Local Organizing Council completes the business planning process (including a feasibility study and business plan), secures a site, secures contracts for everything needed to create the project and to sell what is produced, secures required permits, and raises needed capital.

Step #10) Project Launch. Launch your project to create green jobs and energy resources needed in your community.