{"id":14912,"date":"2021-03-05T12:11:37","date_gmt":"2021-03-05T17:11:37","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.theseventhstate.com\/?p=14912"},"modified":"2021-03-05T12:11:42","modified_gmt":"2021-03-05T17:11:42","slug":"barve-bashes-the-council-on-solar","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.theseventhstate.com\/?p=14912","title":{"rendered":"Barve Bashes the Council on Solar"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

By Adam Pagnucco.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Last month, Delegate Kumar Barve, chair of the House Environment and Transportation Committee, warned the county council<\/a> not to pass a version of a zoning text amendment that effectively prevented most solar development in the agricultural reserve. Now that they have ignored his warning and passed it anyway, Barve has authored a blistering opinion piece in the Washington Post<\/a> condemning the majority of the council for \u201csabotaging affordable clean energy.\u201d Barve also wrote that the council\u2019s action has spawned imitators, possibly leading to \u201ca chain reaction of solar prohibitions.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The state delegation and county electeds have long had ups and downs, sometimes cooperating and sometimes grumbling. Usually the grumbling does not appear in public, but there are exceptions like Delegate Eric Luedtke\u2019s op-ed criticizing county officials for ignoring upcounty<\/a>. Barve\u2019s piece is harsher and, coming from one of the top environmental policy makers in the state, may ultimately be more consequential.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

That said, the council has made its decision on solar in the agricultural reserve. What\u2019s next? Obviously, an election is coming. The most important single change to the original zoning text amendment was one restricting placement of solar panels on certain soil types. That change passed on a 6-3 vote. Three council members are term limited: two who voted for the change (Council Members Craig Rice and Nancy Navarro) and one who voted against it (Hans Riemer). So assuming that all of the remaining incumbents return, the tally would be 4-2 in favor of the soil restriction.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The next council will have 11 members because of the passage of Question C last year. If 4 of the 5 new council members favor solar in the ag reserve, they could undo the soil restriction on a 6-5 vote. Could that happen? It\u2019s possible but it becomes more likely if the Sierra Club \u2013 which supported the original zoning text amendment<\/a> \u2013 conditions its endorsement in the next election on whether candidates favor liberalizing solar restrictions. If that occurs, solar proponents have a shot at getting their way. If not, MoCo\u2019s restrictions have a greater chance of becoming permanent unless Barve and the General Assembly find a way to preempt them.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Adam Pagnucco. Last month, Delegate Kumar Barve, chair of the House Environment and Transportation Committee, warned the county council not to pass a version of a zoning text amendment that effectively prevented most solar development in the agricultural reserve. Now that they have ignored his warning and passed it anyway, Barve has authored a … Continue reading Barve Bashes the Council on Solar<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[151,47,27,265],"tags":[1545,1481,1473,1589],"class_list":["post-14912","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-adam-pagnucco","category-environment","category-kumar-barve","category-sierra-club","tag-adam-pagnucco","tag-environment","tag-kumar-barve","tag-sierra-club"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p4mKJE-3Sw","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theseventhstate.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14912","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theseventhstate.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theseventhstate.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theseventhstate.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theseventhstate.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=14912"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.theseventhstate.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14912\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":14914,"href":"https:\/\/www.theseventhstate.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14912\/revisions\/14914"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theseventhstate.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=14912"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theseventhstate.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=14912"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theseventhstate.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=14912"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}