This Ohio county put a ban on wind and solar. Will…

The group may have links to The Empowerment Alliance, a nationwide pro–natural gas organization that has been an impetus behind bills and resolutions labeling the fossil fuel as ​“green energy.”

A filing with the Richland County Board of Elections identifies the treasurer for Richland Farmland Preservation as Dustin McIntyre, with an address for a building with several offices in Bellville. But VoterRecords.com does not note any Dustin McIntyre in Richland County, nor does Whitepages.com show him living there.

Federal Elections Committee data does list a Dustin McIntyre with an address in Virginia as treasurer for multiple super PACs, including the Affordable Energy Fund PAC. That group was set up by The Empowerment Alliance in 2021.

The alliance began as a project of former Ariel Corp. chair Karen Buchwald Wright and her husband, Tom Rastin, who was also an executive there. Headquartered in Mount Vernon, Ohio, Ariel makes compressors for the oil and gas industry.

The Richland Farmland Preservation website also features anti–renewable energy talking points espoused by The Empowerment Alliance and other groups, including a variation of a graphic used by The Empowerment Alliance that implies gas-fired power plants should be favored over solar because of their smaller land footprint. (The illustration ignores the large swaths of land needed for drilling and pipelines, as well as pollution.)

Neither McIntyre nor Richland Farmland Preservation responded to Canary Media’s emails or calls.

The No Ban on Property Rights campaign held a fundraiser in February, and its volunteers have been distributing lawn signs, door hangers, and brochures. Volunteers with the nonprofit Ohio Citizen Action have also been helping with efforts to raise awareness and get out the vote.

As to whether the Richland Farmland Preservation group was mobilizing in a similar way, Banks told Canary Media he didn’t expect it to hold a general fundraiser. Instead, he noted that they planned to ​“call a few people.” Without saying who, he said, ​“There’s some people who will put some money towards this.” 

Nonetheless, the push to preserve the renewable energy ban is tapping into real anxieties about ceding land to non-farming uses.

“We’re seeing more and more farmlands being used up for developments, and we want to keep them as farmlands,” said John Jaholnycky, who previously worked for natural gas and electric companies and is now a trustee for Mifflin Township, which opted for the ban.

In Jaholnycky’s view, solar should go on buildings and over parking lots. ​“I think it’s kind of shortsighted that we want to use up all of this farmland to put these solar panels up.”

Richland County Commissioner Cliff Mears pointed out that the city of Mansfield plans to add a solar farm at the site of a former landfill. But he added, ​“We feel that farmland overall should remain farmland.”

Still, blocking renewables won’t necessarily preserve farmland. In fact, urban and suburban development has been the major threat over the past several decades.

From 2002 through 2022, Ohio lost over 930,000 acres of farmland. Researchers at The Ohio State University reported last year that most of that loss occurred around metropolitan areas, where urban and suburban sprawl was extending into formerly rural areas. The number of acres for certified and planned utility-scale solar projects, meanwhile, is about one-tenth that amount.

Data centers are also a growing concern, with roughly 200 already in the state, and plans for another 100 or so.

For farmers, leasing their land for renewable energy can supplement income and actually let them keep the land in their families.

“The alternative is that [landowners] will sell it for development or data centers or something,” said Annette McCormick, a county resident and opponent of the prohibition.

Nor are renewables necessarily incompatible with farmland preservation.

Agrivoltaics uses land under and around solar panels for grazing sheep or growing forage or other crops. ​“There’s a lot of opportunities for farming” amid clean energy installations, McCormick said. ​“Maybe just not think about corn and soybeans all the time” as the only farming options.

Permit restrictions also generally require renewable energy companies to restore agricultural land when projects finish using it.

Both Banks and Mears criticized SB 52’s provision that lets all voters in the county — not just those in the relevant townships — sign a referendum petition and then vote on the issue. ​“It has nothing to do with anybody in the cities or villages,” Mears said. In his view, voters ​“should have some skin in the game.”

That arrangement was once on the table. An earlier version of SB 52 would have given each township the authority to ban solar and wind and then left any decisions on referendums solely up to its own voters. Ultimately, however, the law put the decision to enact prohibitions — and the rights of voters to seek their reversal — at the county level.

“Every voter in Richland County should have a voice on this important issue because it’s a countywide policy,” said Jen Miller, executive director of the League of Women Voters of Ohio, who grew up in Richland County. Although the commissioners chose to defer to trustees in individual townships, ​“it is the role of county commissioners to represent every voter and to hear from every voter.”

Former Richland County Commissioner Gary Utt agreed: ​“It’s a county issue. Let the people decide.”

Energy costs are also a big issue this year, not just in Richland County but across the state. Utility bills are rising for all customers as electricity demand surges in Ohio, especially with the proliferation of data centers and growth in electrification. Solar power can come onto the grid faster than other sources. Adding more generation quickly could ease the supply crunch, and clean energy could help protect residents from the volatility of fossil fuel prices.

“That affects all of us — not just countywide, but statewide also,” said Christina O’Millian, a volunteer who worked on last year’s campaign to get the issue on the ballot.

Because SB 52’s hurdles apply only to solar and wind farms, it’s ​“picking winners and losers in what should be a free market,” said Fritz of the Ohio Conservative Energy Forum. 

For McPeek, the electrical union business manager, blocking renewables also means fewer jobs for himself and other IBEW members throughout the county. 

“Historically, communities that sort of close themselves off often see investment and innovation going elsewhere,” he said.

Even if residents defeat the ban, it doesn’t mean that any large solar or wind projects will be built in Richland County.

“It just restores the right of a project to be considered,” McPeek said. ​“There are a lot of hurdles that they have to jump through.”

In unincorporated areas without any ban, SB 52 still lets county commissioners review almost all new large-scale solar and wind farms of 5 MW or more before developers can even file a permit application with the Ohio Power Siting Board.

The law gives commissioners 90 days in which they can prohibit a project, change its footprint, or do nothing. No action means a company can then file its application with the siting board, provided the developer also complied with additional notice and public meeting requirements.

If a company does get to file an application for a solar or wind farm with the siting board, SB 52 then calls for two ad hoc representatives of counties and townships where the development would be located. Those individuals take part in the case as voting members. Any project also must satisfy a long list of other requirements before the siting board grants its approval to move ahead.

Even for projects that have otherwise met all legal criteria, the siting board sometimes simply defers to local government opposition to conclude they are not in the ​“public interest” — a stance that is currently under review by the Ohio Supreme Court.

Ultimately, it may take a repeal of SB 52 and some other legal changes to put all types of energy generation on an equal footing when it comes to siting and permitting.

But for now, advocates for a ​“no” vote on Richland County’s ballot issue are focused on what they can most immediately control: defeating a ban that makes solar and wind a nonstarter from the get-go.

“I want to make my children proud,” said Morgan Carroll, a Shelby resident who urges people to vote no. ​“I want to say that we tried to help them with their energy costs in the future, help the future of clean energy in the county.”