SMECO is a member-owned cooperative, and its board is elected by members like you. Yet management resists rooftop and community solar — calling a customer generating its own power a “subsidy paid by everyone else.” Put the real numbers on one scale and that story falls apart. The board can change this — and the board is on the ballot right now.
Community solar lets you subscribe to a share of a local solar farm — no rooftop, no upfront cost, cancel anytime — and get bill credits worth more than your subscription. Every Maryland utility offers it except SMECO. Here’s what your household is missing.
The one item SMECO calls a “subsidy,” set beside the costs and denied savings its own choices impose on you. Same scale, annual dollars per household.
Hover any bar for the math. The “subsidy” management complains about is the smallest sliver on the chart — and it isn’t even a real cash cost.
What community solar is: you subscribe to a share of a local solar farm — no rooftop, no upfront cost, cancel anytime — and get utility bill credits worth more than your subscription. Maryland reserves 40% of every project for low-income households (a guaranteed ≥10% discount); the rest is open to any member, typically 5–10% off and up to ~20% on the most generous plans. SMECO is the only Maryland utility that opted its members out of all of it.
And the one item SMECO calls a “subsidy”? Net metering — and it isn’t even a real loss. A regulated co-op earns its margin on the poles and wires (~$0.054/kWh), not on the energy itself (a pass-through it profits nothing on). SMECO’s entire year-end net-metering credit outlay was $220,271.70 — about 0.04% of its $542M revenue (MD PSC 2025 Net Metering Report).
What the co-op earned, what it actually handed back to you, what it paid its executives, and the “subsidy” it says it can’t afford. All per member, one scale.
SMECO earned ~$139 per member in 2025 — more than double 2024 — while telling members it can’t afford net metering. The CEO’s pay alone ($1.08M) is nearly five times the co-op’s entire $220K net-metering credit outlay. The “subsidy”? About $1.26 per member per year — and it isn’t even a real cost.
Here is the tell. SMECO grows revenue by investing capital and winning rate increases to recover it — not by selling energy, which is a pass-through. Rooftop and community solar lower your bill, defer grid spending, and shave the peak that sets PJM’s capacity charge — now at its all-time federal cap. That’s good for the owners and against management’s rate-base incentive. A member-owned cooperative behaving like a rate-base monopoly, against the interests of the people who own it — that is the whole story. And it is your board’s job to stop it.
Bills are climbing toward an ~11× PJM capacity cap — and here is the entire substantive business the board put before members this year, beside what an energy crisis actually calls for.
Housekeeping — plus one change to how members’ unclaimed money is used.
A response to the crisis members are paying for.
SMECO says this money should stay with members. Good — so let’s make the bylaw say it. Here’s the one thing to ask for before you vote.
We asked SMECO directly about the amendment. Its VP of Government Affairs told us the intent is to keep unclaimed capital credits reinvested in the cooperative — in his words, “Member money staying with SMECO,” not given away — and that the charitable-donation language was something a different co-op had wanted. We take SMECO at its word.
But the amendment as written doesn’t lock that in. It removes the bylaw’s current promise that unclaimed credits go to “reduce the cost of electricity to the members” and adds the option to make board-approved charitable donations instead. The 2025 state law (HB 227 / SB 561) only permits that — it says a co-op “may” use the funds to assist members or donate to board-approved charities. So the bylaw can fully comply, and keep the money with members, without the donation option at all.
And the amounts aren’t trivial. At our request, SMECO shared the figures: unclaimed capital credits totaled $4.01 million from 2015–2024, reaching $1.3 million in a single year (2021). Members can always still claim what’s theirs — but for the credits that go unclaimed, this vote decides whether their purpose stays “lower every member’s bill” or becomes the board’s to direct.
An easy fix that matches what SMECO says it wants: vote against §7.04 as written, and ask the board to bring it back keeping the members-first purpose — assist members and reduce their cost of electricity — without the board-approved charitable-donation option. If SMECO means to keep this money for members, make it the rule, not just the intention.
SMECO’s own June 2025 arrearage filing shows past-due bills fall hardest on low-income households — the very members community solar’s guaranteed savings are built to help. Here is who’s behind, by county, and how far a year of community-solar savings goes against what they owe.
Residential accounts carrying a balance aged 30 days or more — the report's financial-stress bands (30–60 days + 60+ days). Everyday under-30-day billing balances are excluded.
Across SMECO's service territory, 55.8% of low-income residential accounts are 30+ days past due versus 19.9% of other residential accounts. The gap is widest where hardship is deepest.
Guaranteed community-solar savings of at least $200/year (Maryland's 10% minimum on a conservative $2,000 annual bill) set against the typical (median) amount a low-income household is past due, by county.
SMECO PC53 Termination & Arrearage Report, June 2025.
| County | Accounts | 30+ days past due | % 30+ | Total owed | Median owed | Solar saves / yr | % of median |
|---|
Source. Southern Maryland Electric Cooperative (SMECO), PC53 Termination and Arrearage Report, June 2025, filed with the Maryland Public Service Commission — Sheet A (total accounts), Sheet C (accounts in arrears by aging band), Sheet D (dollars & median owed). Figures aggregated from ZIP-level rows; county and territory totals reconcile to the report's own totals.
"30+ days past due" combines the report's 30–60 day and 60+ day bands and excludes the under-30-day band, which is largely ordinary billing float rather than hardship. An account carrying balances in more than one band may be reflected in each, so combined counts are a close upper bound on distinct households. "Southern P.G." reflects only the portion of Prince George's County served by SMECO. Median owed is the report's per-ZIP median amount due, account-weighted to the county — a conservative proxy for the typical past-due balance.
Community-solar savings. Maryland's community solar program (Ch. order / HB 908, 2023) guarantees subscribers a minimum 10% savings; low-and-moderate-income capacity is reserved. We apply the 10% floor to a conservative ~$2,000 annual residential bill = ≥$200/year, recurring. Actual SMECO usage typically runs higher, so this understates the benefit. Community solar does not erase a balance at once; it is annual money that helps a household stay current. SMECO, as a cooperative, was permitted to opt out of offering community solar and did so.
Each briefing is built for that county’s delegation and officials, with local household and income numbers. Open yours to see the case — and download the one-pager to share.
Directors are elected by the membership and set SMECO’s direction. Management answers to them — and they answer to you. Add your pledge, then vote before Aug 12 and ask every candidate where they stand on: