Three representatives from Ranger Power (left) with two planning commission members (right). Thomas McKenna | Collegian
A Fayette Township planning commission meeting turned tense Tuesday night when three representatives from Ranger Power took questions from residents about the company’s plan to turn 1,350 acres of farmland into a solar field.
More than 60 people from in and around the township attended the meeting, with about 20 speaking against the project. Nobody voiced support for the plan during public comment, and some of the speakers directed comments toward the Ranger Power representatives.
“These people right here,” said Dennis Rhoniy of Jonesville, tearing up a piece of paper at the podium. “That’s what I feel about them. They don’t care.”
About half of the audience applauded. At another moment, Rhoniy began shouting at members of the commission and stepped toward the stage, but he was walked back to his seat by a nearby man.
Lawrence Peter, who lives on Milnes Road, told the planning commission — which would need to approve the project’s special land use permit — that a green light would put the members “spiritually” in the “wrong place.” When a Ranger Power member said he knocked on every door adjacent to the project’s land, one audience member shouted, “Lies.”
“You claim to be a fair, transparent, open, honest company that wants to be a good neighbor,” said Steve Oleszkowicz, a Fayette Township resident leading opposition through his group No Solar Fayette. “I’d like you to move out of the neighborhood.”
The meeting is the latest flashpoint of local opposition to Ranger Power’s Heartwood Solar II project. The company needs the green light from the township’s planning commission, but residents say the panels would disrupt the view of the landscape and potentially disrupt wildlife and nearby water sources. The project is the second phase of the similar Heartwood Solar I project approved by the township board in 2022.
If the planning commission does not approve the project, Ranger could ask a state regulatory agency — the Michigan Public Service Commission — to override the local opposition, under a state law that took effect in late 2024.
Brady Friss, a development manager for Ranger Power overseeing the Heartwood II project, told The Collegian Jan. 29 that asking the state commission to override the local authority is a “last resort.” Friss said he couldn’t say “with 100% certainty” that going to the MSPC is “totally off the table,” but it is not the company’s intention to use it.
“We’re committed to permitting locally,” Friss said late last month. “That said, the state process exists, but we don’t intend to use it.”
The full township board took the first step to prevent this override at a meeting Monday. The body voted unanimously to contract a Portage-based township law firm, Bauckham, Thall, Seeber, Kaufman & Koches P.C., to help draft a zoning ordinance that would make it harder for the company to build the project or for the state to override.
Many residents — including State Rep. Jennifer Wortz, a Republican who represents parts of Hillsdale and Branch counties — have urged the township board to hire a law firm that could help establish a Compatible Renewable Energy Ordinance, or CREO. This type of ordinance, Wortz, Oleszkowicz, and others have said, would let the township set its own zoning rules for building new renewable energy facilities.
If adopted, a CREO would make it more difficult for the company and state agency to override a potential rejection by Fayette Township’s planning commission.
Planning Commission Chairman Jane Munson said at the Tuesday meeting that she and other members of the planning commission had met with attorneys from the firm earlier Tuesday. But she said they didn’t discuss when the attorneys could deliver a draft of the CREO, because the firm wants to meet with the full board first, likely on Monday.
“It’s not too late,” Munson told the crowd. “This project has not even been reviewed or looked at.”
