Minutes 05-27-2014 - Laserfiche WebLink

Browse Search

County Comprehensive Plan Goal, which is preservation of historical, cultural, architectural, and archeological resources and their associated landscapes." However, this proposed project does not even abut Mount Sinai Road. It is almost a half a mile from Mount Sinai Road. Instead, this project devastates the eastern side of Cascade Drive, which is also a public road. There is no mention of this effect on Cascade Drive anywhere in this memo or anywhere in the planning department assessment. For all of the above stated reasons, I respectfully request that this application be denied. David Rooks: Any questions, Mr. Fox? Michael Fox: No questions for this witness. David Rooks: I'm going to call Ann Oliver. Ann Oliver provided a disk with the information mentioned below, and it is included in public record by reference. Ann Oliver: Hello, my name is Ann Oliver, and I have been sworn. I am Ann Oliver, and I live with my husband, Jim Spainhour at 5502 Cascade Drive, and I have been asked by my neighbors to provide to you some studies, reports and other documents I believe are relevant and will assist in your consideration of the permit application for a solar power plant that will be proposed for our backyard. And I could read to you this list. I think you are all gonna get it. Maybe save some time— I'll just sort of go through what they are. I had noticed —and this was all I could find online about this project, and I noticed that they used some kind of Massachusetts study and a lot of links to some reports. And I decided I might do my own research and find some reports that might help you all. And these sort of cover some of our concerns. There is a report about heat island effects from some scientists from Columbia University. There is a report that just came out recently in April of this year by the National Fish and Wildlife forensics laboratory about avian mortality at solar plant farms. Two of the things I have included are some tax records from Clay County where they reduced the property taxes of properties that adjoin solar plants by as much as 20 to 40 percent. I have also included the Clay County solar farm ordinance, which in the ordinance itself it says they recognize that these things reduce the value of properties that abut them, and they also recognize that there are health issues. I have also included a study by Dr. Tolley from the University of Colorado, and it has to do with property values, land use and revenues for similar types of facilities, and this one I found really important because it sort of— He talks about the fact that when you put a facility like this in a community when it's not consistent with what's already there, it just starts bringing it down. It becomes like a sort of blight on the neighborhood. It sort of- people lose the incentive to keep their property up and the whole thing becomes a downward spiral. So, I really recommend that you look at that. One of the things that I am most concerned about, I think Jim talked about it already, that we live on lot 1 right here. And actually this little dot is slightly bigger than our own home, but I did that for the purpose that you all could see. It's a Google map that it appears that they use. But one thing that I noticed — I just—when I think about how many of those little dots I could fit into this whole area, it just sort of put it into perspective how big this facility is gonna be. And then the other thing that I'm really concerned about— I want to get back to this thing — is that the orientation of these solar panels, from what I've understood and what I can tell, is that