I support the need for clean energy. There are ways to scale it up that don’t come at the cost of ruining the scenic beauty that makes rural Richland County special – a place where people currently love to live, work, play and where tourists come to spend their dollars.
Few areas in Ohio remain offering the beauty and appeal of our county’s countryside – it represents one of Ohio’s last best places. These scenic qualities are of enormous value and worth protecting.
Township trustees and our county commissioners have banned industrial wind and solar projects in our rural landscape. Your “YES” vote on the May 5th referendum keeps this protection in place.
Giving industrial wind and solar access here (with their collateral damage such as new high voltage lines forced across our properties through eminent domain) would prove catastrophic.
These out-of-state companies target our farmland as it is easier and more profitable for them to build solar arrays there than on the rooftops, parking lots, abandoned industrial sites and other already-developed areas where they belong.
As property owners, for the most part we enjoy the right to do what we want on our property so long as it does not create a severe detriment to the public good.
But consider this – our right to swing our fist ends at the tip of another person’s nose – and allowing industrial wind or solar on one’s rural property is delivering a haymaker to the face of neighbors, tourists, commuters – all who frequent this shared countryside and benefit deeply from its unspoiled scenic qualities.
Once leases have been signed with their restrictive fine print favoring the companies, the jarring damage to the homes and quality of life for these unwilling participants is irreversible.
Who wants to buy land looking out over a sea of solar panels or in the shadow of towering wind turbines??
Should a few individuals be allowed to enrich themselves at everyone else’s expense? T
his is one issue where the choice to limit my property rights is an easy decision.
Larry Smith
Mansfield, Ohio