In Tuesday’s Work Session, the entire Council will vote on and discuss proposed regulations for solar panels in Fayette County — the solar panel ZOTA (Zoning Ordinance Text Amendment).
You can read the full text of the ZOTA starting on page 27 of this packet.
In July, the General Government and Planning (GGP) Committee voted to advance a draft of a Solar Panel ZOTA that allows rooftop and ground-mounted solar in several residential and business zones inside the Urban Service Area (USA), but strictly prohibits ground-mounted solar panels in rural Fayette County outside the USA.
5th District Councilmember and GGP Committee Chair Liz Sheehan and 10th District Councilmember Dave Sevigny proposed amendments to the ZOTA that would have allowed ground-mounted solar in rural Fayette County, although with many restrictions. Those amendments were rejected by the GGP Committee.
Tuesday’s Work Session is the first time that Council will get to vote on the ZOTA as an entire body. Councilmembers who do not serve on the GGP Committee may attempt to revise the draft ZOTA in any number of ways.
- Councilmembers Sheehan and Sevigny wrote an op-ed for the Lexington Herald-Leader last week urging the full Council to adopt their proposed amendments to the ZOTA in Work Session.
Councilmember Sheehan announced in July that she and Sevigny would be creating a Task Force that would work to draft regulations for solar panels in rural Fayette County — if the Task Force were to decide rural solar panels should exist at all. No news has been shared yet about the membership or development of the Task Force, and their Herald-Leader op-ed does not say anything about the Task Force.
Whether or not ground-mounted solar panels should be allowed on Lexington’s rural farmland has been a hot topic of debate over the last year.
- Mayor Linda Gorton has sued East Kentucky Power to prevent them from building a 387-acre solar panel farm.
- East Kentucky Power is a public utility that is regulated by the state and is not bound by Lexington’s zoning laws. Any solar panel regulations adopted by Council would only apply to private residents and developers.
- Sillicon Ranch, a private solar panel developer, has advocated for solar panel farms to be built in rural Fayette County in hopes that they can build a nearly 800-acre solar panel farm along Haley Road.
- Local advocacy groups and private residents have written several op-eds in the Herald-Leader debating what role rural solar panel farms should play in Fayette County.
You can reach out to your Councilmembers to share your thoughts on the proposed solar regulations.
You can also reach out to the Division of Planning with thoughts and questions about rural solar regulations.
Council will have their first vote as a full body on the solar panel ZOTA on Tuesday, August 19th at 3pm in Council Chambers during Work Session. You can attend in-person or watch live on LexTV.
UPDATE: The original version of this story used the terms “Task Force” and “Work Group” interchangeably. The article was updated on August 19th to solely use the term Task Force, the correct terminology for the body Councilmembers Sheehan and Sevigny plan to create to work on solar panel regulations.
