Commissioners send solar ordinance back to plan commission to weigh acreage change

MUNCIE, Ind. − Wrangling over a solar ordinance for Delaware County continued Monday as Delaware County Commissioners voted to reduce the amount of farm acreage in the county that could be devoted to solar fields from 34,000 acres to 5,000.

Earlier this month the Delaware County-Muncie Plan Commission voted to give a favorable recommendation to a new solar ordinance that would allow up to 20% of county farmland, or 34,000 acres, to be open to utility-sized solar development.

That amount was the result of a modification of the ordinance at the plan commission meeting after a solar committee, made up of local citizens, recommended only 2% of farm ground be dedicated to solar.

"I don't want to go back to the plan commission and see it picked apart and we start this all over again," said Commissioner James King, who wanted to reduce the permitted acreage but also wanted to finish debate on the ordinance, which has been contentious for about two years.

More: Two solar farms OK'd for northern Delaware County as rural landscape likely to change

As with other meetings on solar farms, the crowd filled the Commissioner's Courtroom and spilled down the hall on the third floor of the County Building.

Commissioner King said that the solar projects provide tax revenue for the county and for the people in Gaston, which is good. But it needs to be regulated.

"I don't want to have my whole county in solar panels," he said.

He said it was his job to regulate the solar projects and "I'm going to do my freakin' job."

A citizen's committee, put together by late Plan Commission Director Marta Moody and made up of both opponents and supporters of proposed solar projects, worked on creating a new ordinance after controversy erupted over the proposed Meadow Forge project in Washington Township.

County Commissioner Sherry Riggin said that Meadow Forge would include 4,080 acres between Gaston in Washington Township and Matthews in Grant County. If that's correct, after Meadow Forge 920 acres is all that would remain available for solar field development on farmland in Delaware County once the ordinance becomes law.

"To me, it's putting junk on good land," Riggin said of the solar panels. "... We don't know what's going to happen. It's such a new product to out in the fields."

Many of the solar committee's proposals that seemed likely to stymie Meadow Forge were dropped by the Plan Commission. Shannon Henry, president of the county commissioners and also a member of the plan commission, moved to up to increase available acreage from 3,400 to 34,000 at the plan commission level but voted with King at the county commissioner meeting to take the total available farm acreage down to 5,000 acres on Monday.

Now the ordinance goes back to the plan commission for its consideration to make a recommendation on the limit for the commissioners. Brittany Ingermann, office manger for the plan commission, said she would attempt to schedule a meeting of the commission in December to consider the change.

Commissioners said they want to limit the consideration of the ordinance to the acreage limit.

King said he wanted to conclude the debate over solar and the Meadow Forge project, which reportedly included 17 landowners who agreed to lease their land for the project at one point — since renewable energy company Invenergy announced plans for creation of Meadow Forge in 2021.

The community in and around Gaston has been riven by the project and King said it has led to a bombardment of phone calls, emails and criticism from people, both pro and con, during the past two years.

More: Plan Commission endorses solar ordinance allowing panels on 20% of local farm land

The public comment continued during the meeting as audience members were allowed three minutes each to speak without comment from the commissioners.

Invenergy attorney Kristina Kern Wheeler with Bose, McKinney and Evans in Indianapolis, rose to tell the commissioners that what they are doing with the solar ordinance should not apply to the Meadow Forge developer.

"I think you are a little bit off track and I want to make you aware of the biggest concern I have of several," Wheeler said. " ... When it comes to Invenergy Meadow Forge solar project, there is already a signed economic development agreement that every commissioner that's sitting looking at me has put their signature on. And there is a tax abatement agreement. And there is a decommissioning agreement. And there is a road use agreement. All of these things have already been approved.

"I think it is wholly within your authority to regulate future solar projects that come down the pike," she continued. "Where I think you are respectfully off track is when someone has a contract with you that says, quote, 'you will act in good faith to support the project' and you change the rules of the game, mid-project, when my client has spent millions and millions of dollars developing it. I don't think the law is going to support you in that. I urge you, when this comes back to you that you consider putting language in the ordinance that clarifies that this applies to projects that have not been impacted and improved by the county already."

Wheeler said it was like signing a deal and then reneging because one party has a change of mind.

"The law does not let you do that if I've done nothing wrong," she said. "And we haven't done anything wrong and we haven't lied to anyone."

Wheeler had told commissioners that Invenergy would be discussing the matter with the commissioner's attorneys.

State Rep. Sue Errington, D-Muncie, a proponent of solar, said there were "a couple of flaws" in the changes to the ordinance.

She was concerned farmers in other parts of the county would not be able to take advantage of installing solar fields on their land with the new acreage limit. She also said a 500-foot setback from the property lines of nonparticipating property owners was problematic and more than setbacks suggested by the Indiana General Assembly.

More: League of Women Voters campaigns for solar energy ahead of proposed ordinance

Opponents of Meadow Forge also spoke, including Brittany Mock, who said her home would be have acres of solar panels on three sides of her home and said that nonparticipating landowners need to be protected.

"I don't want to live in a solar prison," she said.

County government has imposed a solar moratorium on the creation of solar fields in the county until a solar ordinance is passed or until Dec. 31.

David Penticuff is a reporter with The Star Press. He can be reach at dpenticuff@Gannett.com.

This article originally appeared on Muncie Star Press: Solar ordinace back to plan commission over allowable farm acreage