Outage Map
Contact Us
Northern Neck Electric Cooperative is proud to announce several promotions within its engineering department. Pat Henry, vice president, of engineering will be retiring in early 2024. To maintain the record of excellence in system reliability and efficiency, Steve Minor has been promoted to vice president, of engineering. Steve Bushong has been promoted to manager, of technical services. NNEC has initiated a succession planning process, where internal and external talent receives on-the-job training from retiring professionals to maintain continuity of operations.
Pat Henry began his career at Northern Neck Electric Cooperative in April of 1985 as an electrical engineer. After several promotions, Henry became vice president of engineering in 1999. Henry led the co-op through many of its important milestones including designing its first internet infrastructure, digitizing the maps, transitioning from manually read meters to automatic meter reading, establishing the first outage management, SCADA, and load control and voltage reduction systems, building several new substations and much more.
“Pat has been pivotal to the success of this co-op over the last nearly 40 years. Much of his work has been behind the scenes, but his efforts have improved nearly every inch of our over 2,100-mile distribution system,” said Brad Hicks, president and CEO of NNEC. “I will miss his inquisitive nature the most because he always thinks so deeply about the best ways to serve the members. Thankfully, we will still have his expertise and his mentorship throughout this year.”
Steve Minor joined the co-op in 2013 as an electrical engineer after working at the Dahlgren Naval Base. Minor has managed engineering services for NNEC since 2018. Most recently, Minor managed NNEC’s role in the Northern Neck Broadband Partnership helping to deliver fiber internet to more than 6,000 underserved people in the region. He has also led the co-op’s new maintenance program for substations and other critical pieces of equipment. In his new role as vice president of engineering, Steve Minor will manage the engineering department, which designs, maintains, and operates NNEC’s electric grid. He completed his studies at Virginia Tech, and he holds a professional engineer license.
“Steve has proven his leadership skills with the broadband project, which has been one of the largest undertakings of our co-op in the last few decades, including the design and review of thousands of pole attachments and make-ready construction and the management of dozens of contractors,” said Hicks. “I am excited to have Steve as part of my leadership team as we continue to deliver exceptional service and reliability for our members.”
Steve Bushong joined the co-op in 2019 as an electrical engineer. He has worked at several electric co-ops in a variety of roles including chief executive officer/general manager at Nushagak Electric and Telephone Cooperative, Inc. Bushong has been promoted to manager, of technical services, where he will manage substation design and maintenance, power quality, SCADA, metering, and equipment testing and maintenance. Bushong completed his studies at Virginia Tech.
“Steve Bushong’s wealth of knowledge and experience, along with his productivity and support of all functions within the engineering department have been invaluable to our success,” said Minor. “We are lucky to have him here at NNEC, and I am proud to have him on our team.