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The Morris City Council last night voted on two conditional permitted use request. The Morris Development Review Committee and Planning and Zoning Commission recently heard from representatives with Proctor and Gamble as well as ENGIE Distributed Renewables about a ground-mounted behind the meter solar farm and a ground-mounted community solar farm that would be constructed on the property of Proctor and Gamble.  
Morris Mayor Chris Brown spoke about the difference between the two solar farms. 
“This particular one is the one that that Procter and Gamble would use to the north that would be strictly to energize their building. The next one is the community solar, which would be to the west that would go back to the grid. So there’s two different. I just want to be clarifying. There’s two different things here. So this first one we’re talking about now is behind the mirror, which services they’re building.” 
Morris City Planner Mike Hoffman said the DRC committee approved both site plans for the solar farms earlier this year and the Planning and Zoning Commission recently gave a positive recommendation for both conditional permitted use requests. He said the DRC was originally against the solar farm idea. 
“So our recommendation was denial of the conditional use because we think that, part of the issue with solar farms like this is the opportunity cost. Right? So if you built the solar farm and the property’s going to be tied up for thirty years, We think there’s going to be continued demand for warehouse space and building and that kind of stuff, and this is a good site that’s already got access to utilities. If it was developed as a building, we might be looking at seven hundred. Eight hundred thousand dollars a year in property tax revenue. With the solar farm, we’ll still be getting more than as a agricultural field, but only in the range of about forty thousand as compared to eight hundred thousand that there was a building on it.” 
Morris City Council member Jim Black shared his thoughts during the city council meeting last night. 
“Our comprehensive plan does not call for a solar farm in this location, and the city has a history of filing objections to solar farms that do not agree with our comprehensive plan. Let’s not set a precedent that solar farms can contradict our comprehensive plan. Please join me in voting no to both Procter and Gamble solar farm proposals.” 
The Morris City Council last night unanimously voted no on approving both conditional permitted uses. The council could not make a decision at their meeting in September. For now the two solar projects will not be moving forward.
For more information about prior articles, visit below: 
https://www.wcsjnews.com/news/local/two-solar-farms-could-be-constructed-on-procter-gamble-property-in-morris/article_d1937de0-fc81-472d-a17f-c7f6d93e657f.html
https://www.wcsjnews.com/news/local/two-solar-farms-that-could-be-constructed-on-procter-gamble-property-remain-in-limbo/article_91ac8cc4-5c02-44d7-8804-07260e0faa77.html
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