Lawmakers are taking a bold new regulatory step.
Faced by electric cooperative managers’ misdeeds, they have ordered regulators to oversee operations.
This means that, due to the misdeeds of a few cooperative boards, all cooperatives such as Mid-Carolina in Lexington County will be subject to oversight rules.
The Office of Regulatory Staff will assure for the 1st time that the 20 cooperatives are accountable to their member owners.
ORS Executive Director Nanette Edwards said oversight expenses must be certified annually by the Public Utilities Review Committee and the co-ops will reimburse ORS for them. 
“We don’t know if it will require on-site inspections,” said Ron Aiken of ORS. “We are already hiring in our audit and rates departments.”
Senators passed the oversight bill 42-0 after The State newspaper reported board members of Tri-County Electric which serves southern Lexington County were giving themselves high pay, benefits and perks with their members’ money.
More than 1,500 Tri-County members met and fired the board that kept them in the dark.
The bill, sponsored by Rep. Russell Ott who represents Lexington County, requires co-ops to:
• Notify their member-owners of board meetings 10 days in advance and publish records of their meetings for customers. Before last year, that information was rarely available.
• Prohibit co-op board members from filling vacancies. Many co-op boards have filled vacancies with friends and relatives.
• Bar co-op boards from business relationships with the utility they govern and from hiring family members.
• Co-op members will elect their boards with early voting and polling machines to be open at least 4 hours.
• Ban candidates from campaigning near a co-op’s annual meeting when members are voting.