“We receive little to no benefit from this project,” wrote Chad and Melissa Mayr of Donaldsburg Lane in a letter to the planning commission that was read aloud during the April meeting.

These Rockbridge residents aren’t swayed by the utility bill deductions. For one thing, they aren’t eligible to subscribe to the program.

The people who live near the Mackeys Lane parcel are customers of BARC Electric Cooperative. But this project is affiliated with Dominion, so only Dominion customers can subscribe and reap the benefits of this project.

Weinand mentioned that BARC has a shared solar project in Rockbridge County, and “these neighbors have the opportunity to participate in shared solar through that project. Unfortunately, not through this project.”

However, CVE welcomes “the opportunity to discuss alternatives to offer substitute credit savings to these neighbors that would be comparable to the subscribers for Dominion,” Weinand said in April. 

But this seems unlikely to convince residents to change their minds.

Every speaker during the public hearing portion of both the April and May meetings was a resident of Rockbridge, and each of them opposed the project. 

The primary concerns of residents are the visual impact of the panels and the potential drop in their property values from living near a solar farm. But residents are also concerned with construction noise and traffic, the stormwater retention pond that will need to be built, and the loss of agricultural land in the county. 

“We purchased our home because of the lovely countryside, and there is no sin in wanting to live in the midst of a beautiful setting,” said Tom Kirby, a resident of Donaldsburg Lane, at the May meeting. “At no time did we request that a solar array with thousands of panels be installed on our rolling hills.”

Kirby and his wife, Erma, live in the Donaldsburg community, which overlooks the proposed parcel. They would be able to see the panels from their house, where they moved after their daughter Jennifer Carlucci and her husband Nick moved to the area.

And residents like the Kirbys and Carluccis aren’t satisfied with CVE’s landscape buffer plan, mostly because the trees will take 10 to 15 years to grow to their full height. This is most of the useful life of the project, which is 25 to 35 years. 

Kirby brought a real estate magazine with him to the meeting to illustrate his point. 

“Nowhere could I find a property in here that was listed as being ‘nestled near a solar array’ with many thousands of panels, steelworks, new roads and power lines,” he said, garnering laughs from the crowd.

Instead, “what I found was numerous ads beginning with the words, ‘magnificent,’ ‘rural setting,’ ‘gorgeous views,’ ‘spectacular sunsets,’” he said.

Patricia Thomas, who bought land on Donaldsburg Lane in 2018 and started building a house in 2021, also spoke at the May meeting. She said that she and her husband experienced numerous building setbacks due to the pandemic, but they continued the process because they were in love with the area.

The Thomas’ were “absolutely heartbroken” when they heard about the solar proposal, Patricia Thomas said. 

“The stunning landscape of Rockbridge County has attracted countless residents who have invested not only in their money, but their lives in this community,” she said. “Allowing solar power plants to string up across Rockbridge will permanently change its character and eliminate its allure for people like us.”

Many residents emphasized that they aren’t anti-solar. But they said they don’t believe this is the right location for a solar project. 

“Context is very important,” Philip Bailey, a Mackeys Lane resident, said at the May meeting. “When you take a shower, you go in the privacy of your own bathroom. However, you do not take a shower standing on downtown Main Street.”

Bailey said that this project in this location would make no sense because it would be out of context. 

And while resident opinion had not changed between April and May, parts of the CVE site plan had. Weinand shared these updates and details, including previously unknown information about construction.

The number of trucks that might be driving up and down Mackeys Lane was a particular concern for Planning Commission Member Melissa Hennis. 

At the end of the meeting, members decided to take the rest of their 60-day time limit for action and delay their recommendation until the June meeting.

There will be no public hearing portion of the meeting in June, though Rockbridge residents have certainly made their position on this issue known.

David Whitmore, the Natural Bridge representative for the planning commission, said in an interview after the April meeting, that he heard the residents’ opposition “loud and clear.”

“I think most people would agree that renewable energy is a good thing, and most people would agree that they don’t want it in their backyard,” Whitmore said. “You have to kind of balance the concerns of the neighbors to what the company is trying to do.”

He said emotional factors like the resident pushback (some of the speakers were close to tears at the May meeting) can impact the commission’s verdict.

“I won’t say it doesn’t play into the decision,” Whitmore said. “But we have to kind of separate ourselves from that…The special exception is allowable, but it has to follow certain guidelines and we’re still kind of formulating what those will be situation by situation.”

The 2020 Clean Economy Act requires that power companies like Dominion eliminate carbon-emitting power generation by 2050, which means that more proposals for solar could be coming to many counties in the near future.

Rockbridge does not currently have zoning districts dedicated to renewable energy, but Whitmore said this is something the county is working on, so it won’t have to debate on special exceptions as often.