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County planners urge clearer special-use language and siting checks in Melrose Township solar ordinance
Summary
Charlevoix County Planning staff reviewed Melrose Township proposed text amendments on personal and commercial solar, recommending that 'Solar Energy Farms' be regulated as a special use, that buffers require native evergreens, that maintenance replacement be required 'by the next growing season,' and that the township reconsider an 80-acre minimum in areas composed largely of wetlands.
The Charlevoix County Planning Commission reviewed proposed zoning text amendments from Melrose Township on April 9 and recommended several clarifications and standards intended to make the proposed solar rules more usable and less exclusionary.
Planning Director Kiersten Stark told commissioners the township’s attorney had made edits to earlier draft language; she recommended that the Solar Energy Farms subsection be moved into the township’s Article X (Special Use Permits) so that solar farms would clearly require a special use permit in the Forest Conservation (CR) District and that the text should state explicitly that special use permits are required. She also said the draft uses a nonstandard phrase (“Uses Permitted Subject to Special Conditions”) and suggested the township adopt the ordinance’s existing terminology of permitted uses or special uses.
Stark and commissioners identified several substantive edits: add standards and objective criteria for when wildlife-friendly fencing might be required; require native evergreen trees in the buffer standard; and insert the phrase "by the next growing season" to clarify when vegetation removed during maintenance must be replaced. Commissioners also discussed whether installing a berm could serve in lieu of some vegetation requirements to reduce costs and allow planting of smaller trees.
Commissioners raised siting concerns: Stark said most parcels that would meet an 80-acre minimum for a solar energy farm in the township are state-owned land east of U.S. 131 and consist largely of wetland in the Bear River valley, which could make the 80-acre threshold effectively exclusionary unless smaller parcels are combined. Commissioner Sherm Chamberlain recommended the township reconsider the 80-acre minimum if eligible parcels are unsuitable for development.
By motion of Nancy Ferguson, seconded by Mike Ritter, the commission found no record that the township had acknowledged receipt of the county’s prior comments on these amendments and encouraged Melrose Township to review the earlier county comments along with feedback provided at the April 9 review; voice vote: all in favor and the motion carried.
