Original Post Made By: Facebook User David Herman, in the Facebook Group: Stop Solar Farms
September 10, 2020
Terri Carlson
September 10, 2020
These are the two industrial solar plants proposed for our township--5200 acres!!! We have 10 acres and will be surrounded on 2 sides. So angry! We moved here to get away from the big city/industry. This is ALL prime farmland!!!
David H. Group Admin for the Stop Solar Farms Facebook Group:
Why do they insist on ruining prime farmland ?? Around residential areas? There is unused land already owned by energy companies, old stripper pits/mined land, government owned land without surrounding residents! I agree. It makes me ANGRY, too!!!
Denise Spooner
To: Terri Carlson
Has anyone appealed or are the people planning an appeal? I’m part of the fight in Madison County to stop a 120MW Solar Farm (1,890 acres). We are still waiting the Judges decision. But we do have a lot of evidence. I am real estate broker and have fought hard over property values, proving they would be hurt.
Terri Carlson
To: Denise
the few neighbors we have all signed Geronimo's paperwork to keep them quiet for 30 years. Geronimo threatened to put prison type fencing right on the property lines with panels 15 ft. away. The zoning board denied our moratorium.
Lee county, Dixon Illinois. The map shows 2 different solar farms. The one around us (Geronimo) has just passed the zoning board. Duke Energy is the other larger solar plant. They have not yet had their court dates. There has been very little opposition to either. It's maddening!
They keep it quiet until the last minute and the people have but a short time to organize and make a defense.
It happened to us here as well, but we fought back hard & caused delays that bought us time. I was able to gather 6 months of real estate data of how the proposed solar plant was affecting our area.
Since this time, we also have gained other real estate data from NC. I’m now awaiting on a call from an appraiser in KY who has been fighting there as well.
The developer in our county (Madison County, IN) is Invenergy. They are one of the worst lying corrupt companies I have ever seen and have composed a wrap sheet on them a mile long from internet articles, court cases, and more.
They hired an appraiser from Chicago who lied before our BZA. I caught him and pointed out his “mistakes” to the BZA. The project still was passed due to corruption/politics, but we filed an appeal on several things. But the fact that I proved their appraiser to NOT be credible, plus I gave 6 months of data showing injury to neighboring properties, including one sale that sold for $117,000 while appraising for $140,000 (that’s a 16.5% decline).
I have 11 other broker’s statements regarding their opinions and multiple buyer statements and feedback that they would not make an offer. It is an absolute insult to common sense to say that a home being surrounded on all 4 sides will not have property value injured!
All data the Developer’s use is misleading....NOT ONE home is affected on more than one side and ALL the solar plants they use as comparable are very small and do not even compare to the massive behemoths they plan to build.
It is ridiculous that the BZA is bought/lying.
Not only this, but we also have an Impact Report done by an Agricultural Economist showing the other side to the story of what happens when you take 1890 acres of prime farmland out of production for 35 years. The result is an annual loss of $2,344,737. Over 35 years, this adds up to over $82 million dollars!
Who will be getting the short end of the stick in the end because all Invenergy has promised is $24 million in tax revenue!
The decommissioning plans are a joke too! The county will never have enough to return the land back to Ag use. It will be a complete wasteland.
And that’s another thing, ~ these Developers have NO agronomists or soil scientists on their side that agrees with them that the land can easily be returned to Ag use. We do have an Agronomist standing against this and he’s from NC. We have his reports and slide presentations that were part of our evidence.
My binder is about 5” thick and growing, lol. There’s basically 5 categories to all of this:
Property Values
Decommissioning
Agricultural Impacts
Economic Impacts
Health & Safety Concerns
We have to get this info to people and educate them so they can get it submitted and file appeals. Lawsuits need to be filed against counties for not protecting the people.
If you don’t plan to appeal and fight, my advice is to list and sell immediately, but do the right thing and disclose it. You may take a loss, but get away and make sure where you move to will be by neighbors who know the truth and will not ever do this.
As a real estate broker, a farmer’s daughter and a health advocate, ~ my biggest concern about these massive solar plants is the toxicity and contamination to ground water, regulated drains, streams, creeks, and residential wells from many toxic sources, ~ the worst being GenX (aka forever chemicals). See the Solar Crisis in Madison Facebook page to learn more. There have a been a couple posts about GenX.
Terri Carlson
Thank you--you are absolutely right. We had no idea about this until we received a certified letter in the mail in late July. I am going to keep gathering as much information as I can. I don't want to move.
Terri, is there a local group that is fighting in your area? If so, please let me know the name of the group, so that we can help promote them. On the other hand, if you don't have a group organized yet, let me know and I will help get one started. We have to shed light on EVERY area that is fighting this takeover of our homes and land.
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