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A cornfield in Richland County, Ohio, where commissioners voted this summer to bar large-scale solar and wind developments in 11 out of 18 townships.Jeff Greenberg\/Universal Images Group\/Getty<\/p>\n
\t\t\t\tGet your news from a source that\u2019s not owned and controlled by oligarchs. Sign up for the free Mother Jones Daily.<\/a><\/p>\n This story was originally published by\u00a0Canary Media<\/a> and is reproduced here as part of the\u00a0Climate Desk<\/a>\u00a0collaboration.<\/p>\n Restrictions on solar and wind farms\u00a0are proliferating<\/a>\u00a0around the country, with scores of local governments going as far as to forbid large-scale clean-energy developments.<\/p>\n Now, residents of an Ohio county are pushing back on one such ban on renewables\u2014a\u00a0move that could be a\u00a0model for other places where clean energy faces severe restrictions.<\/p>\n Ohio has become a\u00a0hotspot for anti-clean-energy rules. As of this fall, more than three dozen counties in the state have\u00a0outlawed utility-scale solar<\/a>\u00a0in at least one of their townships.<\/p>\n In Richland County, the ban came this summer, when county commissioners\u00a0voted<\/a>\u00a0to bar economically significant solar and wind projects in\u00a011\u00a0of the county\u2019s\u00a018\u00a0townships. Almost immediately, residents formed a\u00a0group called the Richland County Citizens for Property Rights and Job Development to try and reverse the stricture.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u200b\u201cTo me, it just is bad for the county \u2014 the whole county, not just one or two townships.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n By September, they\u2019d notched a\u00a0crucial first victory, collecting\u00a0enough signatures<\/a>\u00a0to put the issue on the ballot. Next May, when Ohioans head to the polls to vote in primary races, residents of Richland County will weigh in on a\u00a0referendum that could ultimately reverse the ban. It\u2019s the first time a\u00a0county\u2019s renewable-energy ban will be on the ballot in\u00a0Ohio.<\/p>\n From the very beginning,\u00a0\u200b\u201cit was just a\u00a0whirlwind,\u201d said Christina O\u2019Millian, a\u00a0leader of the Richland County group. Like most others, she didn\u2019t know a\u00a0ban was under consideration until shortly before\u00a0July\u00a017<\/a>, when the commission voted on\u00a0it.<\/p>\n \u201cWe felt as constituents that we just hadn\u2019t been heard,\u201d O\u2019Millian said. She views renewable energy as a\u00a0way to attract more economic development to the county while reining in planet-warming greenhouse gas emissions.<\/p>\n Brian McPeek, another of the group\u2019s leaders and a\u00a0manager for the local chapter of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, sees solar projects as huge job opportunities for the union\u2019s members.\u00a0\u200b\u201cThey provide a\u00a0ton of work, a\u00a0ton of man-hours.\u201d<\/p>\n Many petition signers\u00a0\u200b\u201cdidn\u2019t want the commissioners to make that decision for them,\u201d said Morgan Carroll, a\u00a0county resident who helped gather signatures.\u00a0\u200b\u201cAnd there was a\u00a0lot of respect for farmers having their own property rights\u201d to decide whether to lease their\u00a0land.<\/p>\n While the Ohio Power Siting Board retains general authority over where electricity generation is built, a\u00a02021\u00a0state law<\/a>\u00a0known as\u00a0Senate Bill\u00a052<\/a>\u00a0lets counties ban solar and wind farms in all or part of their territories. Meanwhile, Ohio law prevents local governments from blocking fossil-fuel or nuclear projects.<\/p>\n The Richland County community group is using a\u00a0process under\u00a0SB\u00a052\u00a0to challenge the renewable-energy ban via referendum. Under that law, the organization had just\u00a030\u00a0days from the commissioners\u2019 vote to collect signatures in support of the ballot measure.<\/p>\n All told,\u00a0more than\u00a04,300\u00a0people<\/a>\u00a0signed the petition, though after the county Board of Elections rejected hundreds of signatures as invalid, the final count ended up at\u00a03,380<\/a>\u2014just\u00a060\u00a0more than the required threshold of\u00a08 percent of the number of votes in the last governor\u2019s election.<\/p>\n Although the Richland County ban came as a\u00a0surprise to many, it was months in the making.<\/p>\n In late January, Sharon Township\u2019s zoning committee\u00a0asked the county<\/a>\u00a0to forbid large wind and solar projects there. After discussion at their\u00a0February\u00a06<\/a>\u00a0meeting, the county commissioners wrote to all\u00a018\u00a0townships in Richland to see if their trustees also wanted a\u00a0ban. A\u00a0draft fill-in-the-blanks resolution<\/a>\u00a0accompanied the letter.<\/p>\n Signed resolutions<\/a>\u00a0came back from\u00a011\u00a0townships. The commissioners then took up the issue again on July\u00a017. Roughly two dozen residents came to the meeting, and a\u00a0majority of those who spoke on the proposal were\u00a0against it<\/a>. Commissioners\u00a0deferred<\/a>\u00a0to the township trustees.<\/p>\n \u201cThe township trustees who were in favor of the prohibition strongly believe that they were representing the wishes of their residents, who are farming communities, who are not fans of seeing potential farmland being taken up for large wind and solar,\u201d Commissioner Tony Vero told Canary Media.<\/p>\n He pointed out that the ban doesn\u2019t cover the seven remaining townships and all municipal areas.\u00a0\u200b\u201cI just thought it was a\u00a0pretty good compromise,\u201d he\u00a0said.<\/p>\n The concerns over putting solar panels or wind turbines on potential farmland echo land-use arguments that have long dogged rural clean-energy developments\u2014and which have been\u00a0elevated into<\/a>\u00a0federal policy<\/a>\u00a0by the Trump administration this year. Groups linked to the fossil-fuel industry have pushed these arguments in Ohio and beyond.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s a\u00a0false narrative that they care about prime farmland,\u201d said Bella Bogin, director of programs for Ohio Citizen Action, which helped the Richland County group collect signatures to petition for the referendum. Income from leasing some land for renewable energy can help farmers\u00a0keep property in their families<\/a>, and plenty of acreage currently goes to\u00a0growing crops for fuel<\/a>\u2014not food.\u00a0\u200b\u201cWe can\u2019t eat ethanol corn,\u201d she\u00a0added.<\/p>\n\n