Jodi Borger

OLIVIA VELASQUEZ, 2013

The Youth Tour was a pivotal experience during my transition from high school to college. Growing up in a tiny Ohio village, attending even tinier Pandora-Gilboa High School, I attended Youth Tour in 2013. After high school, I pursued my education at Harvard University, and I am currently studying at the University of Vermont Larner College of Medicine.

Leading the way

Electric cooperatives are not strangers to overcoming challenges. Co-ops were born because bringing power to rural America was (and remains) a difficult task that for-profit utilities wanted no part of.

That explains why, from their beginnings, electric cooperatives have been at the forefront of developing, adopting, and using cutting-edge technology — not because it’s fun and fancy, but because it’s a necessity.

The festival lasts eight to nine weeks, and Kelly, who is a season passholder, says she’ll typically attend six to eight times during that period. She attends often enough that she says her husband knows exactly where she’s headed if she gets up early — and that she’ll be gone for most of the day.

When the property was first acquired, there was a barn, a couple of outbuildings, and a farmhouse that was converted to the first foster home. Since then, five more cottages have been added to the property — each set up similarly to the original farmhouse. Cottages are separated by gender and age and can house as many as 36 residents at a time. 

“Our kids have experienced severe trauma, so one of the things that we really want them to know is it’s okay to just be a kid,” says Kevin Hewitt, CCHO’s president and CEO.

“When I first started at NRECA Market Research Services, nearly 18 years ago, 100% of our surveys were being done by phone,” Sanstead says. “In the past five years or so, I feel that members are still more willing to spend time on a survey for their local electric cooperative than they would be for a political survey, but people’s behavior with phones has changed. Many people will not answer their phone if they don’t recognize the number calling them.” 

“After three days of (watching them make blades), I thought, ‘I bet I can do that,’” says Bill, a self-proclaimed tech geek who works for a company in California. 

As it turned out, he was right.

Bill has a wife, Judy (who now refers to herself as a forge widow), four kids, four dogs, and two cats. He’s been a volunteer firefighter for Milford Township for 23 years and is also a part-time beekeeper. He seems to excel at anything he sets his mind to.

After he talked to his wife, he purchased his first small forge for $150. He already had everything else he needed.

Pink Ribbon Girls serves five regions: Dayton, Cincinnati, and Columbus in Ohio; St. Louis, Missouri; and the Bay Area in California. The organization’s sights are set on expanding their reach to other regions throughout the country, to ensure that no one has to battle breast or gynecological cancers alone.

As Hohenstein can attest, breast cancer affects more than the individual — it affects the entire family.

Even their “humble” beginning wasn’t all that insignificant; the event drew between 100 and 150 agricultural business contacts, family, friends, and neighbors. But now, the event has grown to several thousand in attendance — and that doesn’t even include those who watch the show from neighboring private parties or from safe parking spots nearby.

“Ultimately, we do this to make people happy, especially those in our community,” Mike says. “You don’t do this for the money — you do this because you want to make those people happy. That, to me, is the challenge.”

Homan, who started the project with no previous experience running a business, says she was guided by the Holy Spirit after she was called to action while in her kitchen one day. 

“There was a voice telling me, ‘There are many good people in the world, but they are not coming to my churches. People are so busy with work, schedules, and children that they don’t have time for me — but they will go out to eat,’” says Homan, a member of St. Marys-based Midwest Electric.

Located along the Ohio River in Brilliant, Ohio, Cardinal is Buckeye Power’s baseload source for power generation, meaning it supplies Ohio’s 25 electric cooperatives with electricity 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. It’s also a main economic driver in the region, providing more than 300 jobs. The coal-fired plant consists of three units: one owned by AEP and two owned by Buckeye Power. All are managed by Buckeye Power.