After fighting against the north in the Vietnam War, Janet Rehberg’s father, Thuan Van Phan, came to the United States in 1975, eventually making his way to Fort Smith, Arkansas.
His dream had always been to become an electrical engineer, but because he was drafted so young, he never had an opportunity to pursue it. Phan ended up giving up on that goal to support his family, working mainly in maintenance jobs before eventually retiring.
Today, Rehberg — an electrical engineer — is preparing to step into the top job at EPB, Chattanooga’s public energy and internet utility. She will succeed outgoing CEO David Wade, who will retire from the municipal power company in fall 2026.
“I think he’s over the moon,” Rehberg says about her dad.
Growing up, Rehberg initially aspired to become a national news anchor because of the influence of Connie Chung, a trailblazing Asian-American journalist.
“Connie Chung was the only female role model really on TV at the time, and so I’ve always watched her and thought, ‘Man, I want to be like her,'” Rehberg says.
However, coming from a conservative Asian family, Rehberg says her parents had very specific expectations for her career path.
“They’re like, ‘Oh no. Either doctor or engineer,'” she says. “So I thought, ‘Why not try to pursue my dad’s dream for him?’ Because I didn’t really know what I wanted to do.”
Many of her friends initially second-guessed that route.
“‘You don’t look like an engineer, you don’t talk like an engineer, you don’t dress like an engineer,'” Rehberg remembers. “Really what they were saying is, ‘You’re a women. That’s probably not a path for you.'”
Rehberg did it anyway.
She enrolled in electrical engineering at the University of Tulsa, where she was one of three women in a class of 50 peers. By the time she graduated, half of the class had left. Many of her male counterparts dropped out, but the three females remained.
After graduating, Rehberg expected to work on animatronics at Disney World. Robotics was a popular field at the time, she noted — but she ended up interning that summer at a utility, American Electrical Power (AEP), as she prepared to return to school on a full scholarship for her master’s degree in electrical engineering.
AEP ultimately offered to pay for her graduate degree, suggesting that she instead get a masters in business administration. She stayed with the company for about 10 years until she realized she was ready for a change.
“An investor-owned utility is all about, kind of, the bottom line,” Rehberg says, noting she was ready to work for a community-based organization like the United Way or the American Cancer Society. She wanted to wake up every morning and feel gratified.
Rehberg was introduced to an electric co-op — a not-for-profit utility — where her responsibilities shifted away from engineering and towards marketing, economic development and workforce training. Her communication skills have always been a strong suit.
“They wanted me to run some of those more soft skills department to help translate technical things for our clients,” she says.
At the onset of the pandemic, she was recruited to a Texas co-op and moved her family cross country to the Dallas-Fort Worth area, which she remembers as being strangely desolate at the time because of COVID. Normally, that part of the state would be as busy as Atlanta.
“It felt almost like ‘The Walking Dead’ driving through there,” Rehberg says. “It was just odd, eerie feeling, but it was kind of cool that we could travel with really no traffic.”
Rehberg served as the chief strategy officer at the Tri-County Electric Cooperative, working in economic development as well as community and government relations. About three months after her family moved, Winter Storm Uri hit the region, causing widespread power outages in Texas that left millions of people in the dark, lacking warmth and the ability to cook food, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. It also proved to be a major test for the co-op.
“Imagine TVA going into bankruptcy right after a week of a massive winter storm,” Rehberg says, referencing the federal utility that supplies power to Chattanoogans and millions of other people in the Tennessee Valley. “That’s what happened to us. Our (generation partner) went into bankruptcy, and they could no longer sell generation.”
The co-op had to learn how to buy and sell energy on the markets and build its own power generation department. Rehberg ultimately served as the interim CEO of the utility for about a year until Wade, the now outgoing CEO, met her at a conference. At the time, Wade was scouting for a new president of strategic initiatives, a role that would oversee cutting-edge technology like the utility’s quantum network.
“We had a great conversation,” Rehberg says. “I didn’t even know he was out scouting.”
Wade called her about three weeks later and asked if she would be willing to meet with the executive team and the board. That call was likely in May, Rehberg recalls. Her first day at EPB was in August.
“It completely changed the trajectory of my career,” she says. With 20 years under her belt, Rehberg had worked for an investor-owned utility and an electric co-op but never a public power company.
Rehberg started researching EPB, checking employee profiles on LinkedIn. Many companies struggle to retain talent, and she was impressed with how much of EPB’s workforce had been at the company for at least 20 years, which she saw as a strong indicator of a good work culture. The utility’s board also consisted of highly accomplished members of the local business community.
She and her husband also read customer feedback on Reddit and Facebook and were struck by the level of positivity.
“A lot of times with utilities, we don’t even wear our logo when we go after hours … because of what the public would think of us,” Rehberg says. “Because when you think about a utility, a lot of times people think about rates or outages. They don’t think of their utility as a community partner and EPB was so unique in that aspect.
“It’s refreshing for me to be able to have customers who actually see us as a partner versus as the electric provider or the internet provider.”
EPB operates in a 600-square-mile service area and has gained recognition with its deployment of the world’s fastest community-wide internet and its forays into quantum technology. As energy needs grow, quantum computing has the potential to rigorously boost the efficiency of systems to reduce power consumption and keep rates low for customers.
“We never thought that we would ever have a quantum physicist at a utility,” Rehberg says.
Rehberg’s dad, Phan, has also received recognition for his inventiveness. In 2013, he and Rehberg appeared in an episode of “Bizarre Foods America,” which featured a small boat that Phan had constructed out of an old wheelbarrow, Styrofoam, a car battery and a propeller. The contraption enabled him to place a multi-hook line farther out than normal, putting it within prime fishing territory.
“It’s crazy and ingenious and it kicks traditional fishing’s ass,” show host Andrew Zimmern says in footage of Phan reeling in a trio of slippery catfish. “Most guys fishing the Arkansas River would be lucky to catch this many catfish in a single day. This haul is typical for one run.”
Admiring the invention, Zimmern asks Phan if the phrase “When you were born, you broke the mold” is also common in Vietnamese.
“It means you’re one of a kind,” Zimmern says.
“Thank you,” Phan says with a smile on his face.
Janet Rehberg
* Education: University of Tulsa (Oklahoma), Bachelor of Electrical Engineering; Capital University (Ohio), MBA
* Career: 2004-2014: American Electric Power – Began her career in Oklahoma and was promoted to Ohio headquarters where she worked in a variety of engineering and project management roles. 2014-2020: Ohio’s Electric Cooperatives – Hired as Director of Marketing before becoming Director of Cooperative Development. 2020-2024: Tri-County Electric Cooperative (Texas) – Recruited as Chief Strategy Officer and VP of Engineering; later served as Co-Interim CEO. 2024: EPB – Joined as President, Strategic Initiatives; appointed to President and CEO-Elect in 2025.
* Interests: Self-proclaimed “Jack of all trades, master of none.” Trying new things such as body building, pageantry, New York Fashion runway, glass blowing, citizen’s police academy, race car driving, golfing and more.