One lawmaker says downstate residents are being ignored on energy

[February 14, 2023]  By Andrew Hensel | The Center Square

(The Center Square) – An Illinois state lawmaker filed a bill to create the “If This Is Such A Good Idea, Let’s Start With You Act.”

He says it’s an effort to start a conversation about where to place alternative energy projects.

Last month, Gov. J.B. Pritzker signed a bill that takes the authority away from county governments on where to set up alternative energy projects. The legislation, which passed in the lame-duck session of the previous General Assembly, provides counties with "guardrails" for siting wind farms, and would create a commission that would oversee and approve wind turbines everywhere but Chicago.

Earlier this month, state Sen. Chapin Rose, R-Mahomet, introduced Senate Bill 1867, a measure he called “political sarcasm.”

The “If This Is Such A Good Idea, Let's Start With You Act” reads that by June 30, 2024, the city of Chicago must convert Millennium Park into a solar energy park by building solar energy facilities on all open spaces and by mounting solar energy facilities on structures. The measure also includes language requiring equipping a wind turbine on the sculpture “Cloud Gate.”

“The City of Chicago and the Chicago Park District must place multiple wind energy facilities in each public park operated by the City or Park District,” the bill said.

Rose said the measure is in response to state energy policies.

Illinois state Sen. Chapin Rose, R-Mahomet
Greg Bishop | Watchdog.org

"It is designed to illustrate in a humorous way this hypocrisy out of the progressive left and Cook County," Rose said. "Last session, they brought us a bill to overrule the ability of local county boards to site windmills in downstate Illinois."

He said downstate residents are being shut out of the conversation on where to build alternative energy projects.

"They are saying that you can put a windmill a tenth of a mile or a block away from your home in downstate Illinois, but yet they do not want them in Chicago," Rose said.

Chicago currently has many structures in the city limits that have solar panels, but Rose said those were put in place through different procedures.

"The point here is that individual peoples’ business through their local governing siting standards, this is now the state of Illinois taking away the ability to make those decisions locally," Rose said.

The Republican said he did not expect his bill to pass, but he hoped to foster more cooperation between Chicago and downstate counties on the issue of where to put alternative energy projects.

Andrew Hensel reports on issues in Chicago and Statewide. He has been with The Center Square News since April of 2021 and was previously with The Joliet Slammers.