Agenda - 09-01-2015 - 6a - Laserfiche WebLink

Browse Search

29 1 Patrick Mallet: I believe the intent is to subdivide the property. Which could be done with an 2 exempt subdivision, both parcels would be greater than 10 acres. This area, roughly in red — 3 roughly depicts the area that would be subdivided. 4 5 Beth Trahos: Good evening, Mr. Chairman and Commissioners, and Chair Person and 6 Planning Board Members. My name is Beth Trahos. I'm an attorney with Smith Moore 7 Leatherwood, and I'm here tonight on behalf of White Cross Solar, with our application to allow 8 a solar farm on White Cross Road. Mr. Chairman, you mentioned that there are a number folks 9 signed up to speak on this and I think I'm responsible for many of them. In our expert group, we 10 have Engineer George Retschle, Appraiser Tom Hester, Appraiser Rich Kirkland, Cypress 11 Creek Renewables Employee Rich Moretz, and Mechanical Engineer Tommy Cleveland. They 12 are all on that list and are all a part of our presentation. And I handed out to you a notebook 13 that you will find at your seat that includes sworn Affidavits, copies of the site plan, and of the 14 prospective that were provided as a part of our submittal packet. And I would ask you to move 15 into the record the staff report and associated documents and that you also include in the record 16 the notebook that we have handed to you. 17 18 We're going to attempt to be efficient with your time and rely largely on those Affidavits. All of 19 those folks are here today and available for cross examination. We'll call a few of them up to 20 talk with you and we'll bring others, as needed, to answer questions that you, or others, may ask 21 of us. We recognize you've been here for a long time, and we'll try to get you out— get our part 22 done as quickly as we can. As staff indicated, we have been working hard with neighbors in the 23 area. We had first the staff sponsored community meeting in April. We had our own meeting in 24 May and we have continued our dialogue with adjacent property owners. And our belief is that 25 our neighbors are comfortable with what it is that we're proposing. Staff indicated the property 26 is zoned AR and a solar farm is permitted as a Special Use in that district. The solar farm site 27 plan meets all of the criteria that are set out in your ordinance for approval of a Special Use 28 Permit. And I'm going to ask folks to come forward and confirm for you that all those 29 requirements have been met. 30 31 I'll start with Mr. Retschle, who is the Project Engineer. I ask him to talk with you briefly. And of 32 course at any time please feel free to ask questions. 33 34 George Retschle: Good evening. My name is George Retschle, I'm the President of 35 Ballentine Associates in Chapel Hill. I have been duly sworn. I do appreciate your time this 36 evening. I am a Licensed Professional Engineer in the State of North Carolina and in Virginia. 1 37 have been involved with a little over hundred solar farms in the past three years. I was 38 responsible for the preparation of the site plan that you have before you tonight. Pat (Mallet) did 39 mention a few modifications that have been made to the site plan since the original submittal. 40 One of those modifications involves a buffer along the northern property line. As a result of 41 some negotiations between our client and the adjacent neighbor, we have widened that buffer 42 from the minimum 50 foot required to a 65 foot buffer. So there's a substantial amount of 43 existing vegetation that's going to remain on that northern property line. And with solar farm we 44 need to be careful of shading on the west, east and south portions of the array, so that we don't 45 have inefficient panels. But along the northern property line, we were able to to provide a much 46 wider buffer than what was required and what we had originally anticipated. That's one of the 47 major changes. 48 49 Another change was that we pulled the southern property line up to reduce the amount of 50 overall property within the property that's going to be subdivided out. I think it went from 23 51 acres down to 19.8, so it's gotten a little bit smaller. The size of the array within the fence is