AlaskaToid

Alaska offers a great climate, for drum roll please...IRS approved 501(C) organizations, or what is known as “Organizations Exempt from Income Tax”. So to date, Alaska offers 2287 registered organizations the benefit of “Tax Exemption” on $12-billion in assets. Now this includes charitable organizations to watering holes, and....electric COOPs – which most of us here in Alaska signed on as members, because we thought a “COOP” was for the membership? But the top (3) leaders in asset protection here in Alaska are as follow: Chugach Electric, with protected assets at $815-Million and a salary for its CEO of $624,000. Then along comes Golden Valley Electric Association, with $583-Million in asset protection, so it pays its CEO $490,000 while the rate payers suffer for electricity that on average is 211% higher then the national average. And in third place here in Alaska, Alaska Electric Energy COOP, yes even the name fools us as this “COOP” finds protection on $227-Million in assets and sends its CEO a yearly salary of $397,000. These are “COOPs” and as defined:

  1. enclosure for poultry;
&
2. a prison or prison cell

And in all honesty, when I see what we pay for electricity here and there and now see what the chieftains take home, I believe we have succeeded in finding ourselves abiding by 1 & 2 of that definition!