The Sangamon County Board’s July 11 reversal of a May vote gave the go-ahead to a proposed $10 million solar farm near the rural Westview Park Subdivision, despite ongoing resentment by board members toward state legislators.
Several board members said they don’t like the fact that a new state law, effective in January, made project approval all but inevitable by removing most county-level zoning authority over commercial wind and solar projects.
“They’ve taken away our options,” board member Annette Fulgenzi, a Sherman Republican, said before the board’s 14-13 vote in favor of River Maple Solar II.
It was the first time in more than 25 years that the board had reversed itself on an issue.
Fulgenzi voted in favor of the 35-acre, 5-megawatt project five miles east of Springfield and five miles north of Rochester on July 11 and on May 9. The measure failed to pass in May on a vote of 13-14.
Trajectory Energy Partners’ project passed on the second vote. While Republican Tracy Sheppard of Auburn changed her previous “yes” vote to “no,” Democrat Clyde Bunch of Springfield, who previously voted “present,” supported the resolution and Republican Pam Deppe of Chatham voted “yes” after voting “no” previously. Republican Craig Hall of rural Loami, who voted “no” in May, was absent from the July meeting.
Neighbors from Westview Park repeated their concerns July 11 that property values would drop, prime farmland would be taken out of production and the project would create an eyesore in a pastoral landscape throughout its 35-year lifespan.
Trajectory officials noted that the acreage taken out of production in the county, which has more than 500,000 acres of farmland, would represent less than 0.007% of the total.
They said studies contradict homeowners’ fears about reduced property values. The project isn’t close to most homes, they said, and the company has agreed to install a $40,000 strip of vegetation on the western edge of the project that eventually could block homeowners’ view of the solar panels.
The project would comply with Sangamon County’s previous zoning requirements as well as the new ones instituted statewide by Public Act 102-1123, according to Seth Uphoff, a Peoria lawyer representing Illinois-based Trajectory. The statewide zoning rules allow projects to be closer to homes than Sangamon’s previous rules.
Bunch echoed the comments of other board members when he said opposing the project would lead to a lawsuit filed by Trajectory, with the company likely prevailing in court because of the state law.
“I don’t like the idea of the state cramming stuff down our throat,” he said.
Fulgenzi, who voted for the project both times, told the approximately 20 opponents in attendance July 11, “I understand the passion of the neighbors.” But it would be a “futile effort” to reject the project, she said.
Westview Park resident Steve Jones told the board: “It’s wrong to put this solar farm in our subdivision. Sometimes, you need to stand up for what’s right.”
Republican David Mendenhall, a rural Buffalo farmer who represents the area in which the project will operate, has opposed it.
There are “hundreds of locations in Sangamon County and adjoining counties” that would be better suited for the project and wouldn’t bother neighbors, he said.
But Uphoff said solar and wind farm developers don’t have eminent domain powers and must work with landowners who are willing to sell or lease their land. And projects need to be near appropriate electric transmission lines, he said.
Tom Martin, who owns the land Trajectory would lease for the solar farm, lives in DeWitt County. He also plans to lease nearby land to Trajectory for two other commercial solar farms that won Sangamon County Board approval.
Officials from Trajectory said they hope to begin construction of the 15-feet-tall, black solar panels by 2025 at the latest. The project, which would be surrounded by a 7-feet-tall chain-link fence, would be 1,000 to 1,200 feet from a north-south row of homes in the subdivision and even closer to homes on the north end of the project.
Dale Matthews, vice president of the Westview Park Homeowners Association, said no one wants an “industrial development next to a residential development.”
Democrats in the Illinois General Assembly used their supermajorities in the House and Senate to pass House Bill 4412, mostly along partisan lines, amid complaints from green-energy advocates that some Illinois counties had enacted strict zoning rules hindering the expansion of wind and solar.
Sangamon, Menard and Christian counties were among 15 counties that advocates of the bill said “have effectively banned or significantly hindered construction of wind and solar facilities.”
The Illinois Environmental Council, an advocacy group, backed the bill. Its executive director, Jen Walling, said, “We do need a lot of wind and solar to meet clean energy goals. The industry is clamoring to come to central Illinois and southern Illinois. This is a great economic development tool. It’s great for property taxes.”
Walling said the law still allows counties to say “no” to projects, despite what Sangamon County officials said. She said she expects lawsuits to be filed by counties and green energy companies to clarify questions surrounding the law.
The Sangamon County Board initiated solar farm zoning rules in 2017, 2018 and 2022 and wind farm zoning rules in 2006, 2012 and 2022, according to Molly Berns, executive director of the Springfield-Sangamon County Regional Planning Commission.
Among provisions in the new state law are time limits for county boards to approve projects that don’t take into account delays in meetings because of inclement weather or the need to gather more information, Berns said.
Even though the law requires boards to approve projects, county boards have a valuable role in the ability of a county board to fully analyze projects and “be a collector of information that is then available to the public,” she said.
“I think the authors of this legislation could have been a little bit mindful that counties are sometimes different in how they approach the public hearing process,” Berns said.
Christian County Board Chairperson Bryan Sharp, a Republican, said the new law disregarded a “lot of due diligence” by county officials in formulating his county’s zoning rules.
The reduction in local control is worrisome, especially when it comes to the use of land in largely rural areas, he said.
“It’s insulting to the local counties that have deliberated on our issues,” he said. “We’re walking a slippery slope as to what’s next.
“We have a very valuable asset out there. We don’t want to infringe on landowners, but we have to protect neighbors and others.”
Dean Olsen is a senior staff writer at Illinois Times. He can be reached at dolsen@illinoistimes.com, 217-679-7810 or twitter.com/DeanOlsenIT.
This article appears in Repurposing MacMurray Hall.
