GRDA’s Summer team … Grand River Dam Authority Chief Executive Officer Dan Sullivan (far right) and Assistant General Manager of Human Resources John Goodwin (far left) pose with the Authority’s 2015 summer workforce, at the GRDA Ecosystems and Education Center in Langley.
Every summer, the Grand River Dam Authority facilities become the backdrop for valuable work experience as summer employees join the temporary workforce to supply an important helping hand. They arrive from several different backgrounds, with several different career goals and then spend their summer days doing several different types of jobs. Some are familiar faces, some are brand new but all become part of Team GRDA, at least for a few months.
They mow the grass during a season when there is much of that to do. They paint the walls and the railings and other structures, during a time when the weather usually cooperates. They answer phones, work in offices and help out in several other ways as well.
Of course, this workforce is Team GRDA’s summer crew. Most of them will be back in the college classroom sometime in August, but right now, GRDA is depending on their contributions at multiple facilities, as part of multiple crews and departments. During the summer months of 2015, they are helping GRDA meet its electric, ecosystems, economic development and efficiency mission for Oklahoma.
Not only is it a summer paycheck, but it is also a preview of what may be a future career path. While that is important to the students, it is also important to GRDA, which places a high priority on its highly-skilled, diverse and experienced workforce. After all, that is where its successful mission has always begun.
Plus, the impact of GRDA’s summer employees also stretches into the surrounding communities. Like the permanent workforce of 500-plus Oklahomans (accounting for an annual payroll of approximately $34 million), summer employees earn important wages that are circulated throughout the state’s economy, in the communities where they live work and play.
So, whether the focus is on the job, the dollars or the work experience, Team GRDA’s summer force is an important component in the GRDA economic engine that facilitates over $450 million in economic activity in Oklahoma annually.
Headquartered in Vinita, GRDA is Oklahoma’s state-owned electric utility; fully funded by revenues from electric and water sales instead of taxes. GRDA’s low-cost, reliable power touches 75 of 77 counties in the state and serves as an important economic development engine for Oklahoma. At no cost to Oklahoma taxpayers, GRDA also manages 70,000 surface acres of lakes in the state, including Grand Lake, Lake Hudson and the W.R. Holway Reservoir. Today, GRDA’s 500 employees continue to produce the same “power for progress” that has benefited the state for 75 years.
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