Leelanau Energy task force boasts big goals: Commissioner Lautner pushes back
UPDATE: Melinda Lautner, a fixture on the Leelanau County Board of Commissioners for nearly three decades and the leading opponent of the County’s clean energy initiatives, resoundingly lost the Aug. 6 primary election to fellow Republican Steve Yoder, by a count of 401 votes to 241 votes, according to preliminary results that were not yet certified.
By Jacob Wheeler
Sun editor
The Leelanau County Energy Futures Task Force, which was created by the County Commission last fall “to identify opportunities and facilitate implementation of energy efficiency and renewable energy in Leelanau County,” has big, green goals for this peninsula.
Acting on a recommendation from the task force, the Commission earlier this year voted to apply for a $1.5 million grant to erect two solar arrays at the County Governmental Center campus between Suttons Bay and Lake Leelanau. The awards, which will be announced by the Michigan Public Service Commission as soon as next month, come from funds from the federal Inflation Reduction Act.
If awarded and approved by the Commission, the solar arrays could provide about 30 percent of the campus’ energy requirements, while saving the County $35,000 per year and more than $1.5 million in energy bills over the next 30 years, said Joe DeFors, chairperson of the Energy Futures Task Force. A 370-panel array would be installed just south of the main building, with a second array over the parking area for the sheriff department’s vehicle fleet.
The County also applied for a second grant for $20,000 from the Michigan Department of Environment Great Lakes and Energy (EGLE) which would fund a study of energy use in Leelanau County in conjunction with the University of Michigan School for Environment and Sustainability.
But the advisory group’s honeymoon ended soon after it was created, with a 7-0 unanimous vote from the County Board of Commissioners on Sept. 19, 2023—with a proviso that “any projects that involve County expenditures or are in County facilities must have Board approval.”
Commissioner Melinda Lautner, a Republican who has represented Solon and Kasson Townships (District 7) for nearly three decades, immediately pushed the newly formed task force to expand from 12 members to 14 members and secured a spot for herself. (Commissioners Gwenne Allgaier and Kama Ross, both Democrats, also have seats on the task force.) Lautner—by far the longest serving County Board member—has attended just one full meeting of the 11 monthly meetings the task force has held since last October.
Despite voting in favor of creating the task force a year ago, she led the opposition to the solar array grant. The Commissioners narrowly approved the grant application on Feb. 20, in a 4-3 vote that fell along partisan lines. Fellow Republicans Doug Rexroat and Jim O’Rourke joined Lautner in opposition. This summer Lautner cast the lone vote against the smaller EGLE grant.
Lautner told the Glen Arbor Sun she opposed the solar array because the governmental center campus has little flat ground and she worried that school and community groups visiting the panels for education would be too close to the county jail. She also objected to an array being placed down the hill near the veteran’s memorial, as originally proposed. And she worried that the solar arrays would reach the end of their useful life before the campus reaped the benefits, saddling the County with the cost of removing them—claims that DeFors disputed.
DeFors sought to calm fiscal concerns by emphasizing that this was a reimbursement grant. The County would initially write a check for the solar arrays but then submit an invoice to the granting authority and receive full compensation.
Lautner, who joined the Board in 1995, faces her first ever primary election challenge on Tuesday, Aug. 6, from fellow Republican, 32-year-old Steve Yoder, who is currently a Solon Township trustee.
While the task force has enjoyed “reasonable” interactions with Rexroat and O’Rourke, the relationship with Lautner has been “challenging,” said DeFors, who had a heated exchange with her during the Feb. 20 meeting when the Board narrowly approved the solar array bid.
“She inserted herself as the very last new member of the task force, then she missed all but one meeting to date,” DeFors told the Sun. “She’s been an opponent of virtually every initiative we’ve put forward.”
Conflict of interest—or fiscal responsibility?
Clean energy advocates in Leelanau County, and Democrats, wonder whether Commissioner Lautner has a conflict of interest when it comes to the Energy Futures Task Force.
She serves on the board of directors of both Wolverine Power and Cherryland Electric Cooperative, which currently powers the government center campus. DeFors said he approached Cherryland about partnering with the task force on the solar project. After first agreeing, the utility withdrew its support.
Lautner is a lifelong Leelanau County resident who with her husband James owns 400 acres. On that land are two gas wells that were drilled in 2008 but never tapped for fossil fuels because domestic natural gas prices dropped during the fracking boom years. The Lautners would reap the profits from any fossil fuels or minerals extracted from their land.
“My understanding is those wells have zero environmental impact,” Lautner told the Sun, adding that a state contractor visited the property earlier this month, and those wells will soon be capped. The state program that caps orphaned oil and gas wells uses taxpayer dollars to do so.
But DeFors accuses Lautner of hypocrisy.
“Here’s an [elected leader] who takes money from the oil and gas industry, accuses us of not having a plan for the environmental impact of our project, forces herself onto the task force and votes against us, all while claiming environmental interest,” he said.
Lautner questioned the need for a solar array at the governmental center, in the first place.
“Why bring a project like that to our County buildings that have no problem paying our electric bills?” she asked. “The County can pay its bills, but we have senior citizens and young families that cannot.”
Lautner said she pushed to join the task force (even though she has missed all but one meeting) in order to “keep the task force on track, if I could.”
“It was created to bring back a report a year later [to the Commission] and look at things all around. But they immediately launched into projects. … The very first meeting they asked for a grant for solar panels on our campus. They didn’t hesitate. I had guessed that was what they were going to do.
“My desire to be on the task force was to help make sure there was agricultural representation when opportunities came up, including any free solar panels out there for agriculture—or for families struggling to pay their bills.”
DeFors, who is also board president of Leelanau Energy, pointed out that they have a relationship with Cherryland Electric to provide economically challenged households in Leelanau Township (Northport) with solar panels. Leelanau Energy, previously called Northport Energy Group, is a grassroots citizens group that has advocated for renewables and energy efficiency investments throughout the County since 2008.
The Energy Futures Task Force “has been working with our tribal representative on ideas for projects to assist that (economically challenged) constituency,” said DeFors.
“But has Melinda attended any meetings to guide and encourage such endeavors? No.”
Renewables vs nuclear energy
Asked about the need to decarbonize our energy use to mitigate global warming, Lautner pointed out that more than 60 percent of Cherryland Electric’s portfolio is “clean” carbon free energy, and 19 percent is renewable. The majority of Cherryland’s non-fossil fuel portfolio comes from nuclear energy.
Wolverine Power (of which Cherryland is a cooperative member) has agreed to purchase two-thirds of the power from the Palisades Nuclear Power Plant on the Lake Michigan shoreline in Van Buren County, which is expected to come back online in 2025 or 2026.
DeFors agreed that Cherryland’s “clean” portfolio stacks up well against other Michigan utilities, even though just 19 percent comes from renewable sources such as solar and wind.
“The better question to be asked is, ‘Should we be satisfied with 40 percent of our electricity coming from sources that pollute the air we breathe when there are other economically viable options available?’”
Lautner’s opposition to solar arrays at the governmental center may be influenced by geopolitics, too. If Leelanau County gets the grant and moves forward with a solar array, it would reportedly work with Harvest Solar, which purchases its panels from Canadian Solar, a company she said “is tied in with the Chinese.”
“Where are the solar panels coming from?” she asked. “They’re shipped out of Canada, but where are they manufactured? An Eastern country?”
Primary battle
For the first time in her nearly 30 years on the County Commission, Lautner faces a primary battle on Tuesday, Aug. 6, from 32-year-old Steve Yoder in her effort to continue representing District 7—reliably conservative Solon and Kasson Townships.
Plenty of yard signs supporting both Lautner and Yoder are visible on a drive through the heart of Leelanau County near Cedar. The election could be close.
Yoder, who manages the Yoder Boxes family business in Solon, worked parttime as a staffer for State Senator John DaMoose (Republican, Harbor Springs) and served for six years as vice chair of the Leelanau County Republican Party.
Nevertheless, Lautner told the Sun that “Steve was approached by some Democrat who asked him to run against me.”
Yoder countered that Lautner informed him she wasn’t going to run again, so he filed the paperwork to do so.
“A lot of community members reached out to me and said they wanted a fresher voice,” Yoder told the Sun. “I always look at any issue with an open mind. I don’t show up just to say ‘no’.
“I want to work with anybody I can to improve the County for the betterment of citizens rather than pushing an agenda. My agenda is what the community wants.”
Lautner claimed she’s never had an agenda, and said she’ll be more conservative that Yoder.
Yoder expressed openness to learn more about the Energy Futures Task Force and renewable energy initiatives, but did express some fiscal hesitation.
“I applaud the energy task force for the work they’ve done,” he said. “I don’t have a problem with what they’re pushing for. Alternative energy is going to be the future, whether we like it or not.
“What’s concerning to me is if we have our County dollars paying for it.”
Future for the Energy Task Force?
The Leelanau County Board of Commissions is currently deadlocked with three Democrats and three Republicans after Democrat Jamie Kramer resigned in late June. That means the future of the Energy Task Force, and whether or not the Board would greenlight the solar array project—if the $1.5 million grant is accepted—could depend on the results of the Aug. 6 primary election and the November general election.
The political makeup of Leelanau’s Commissioners come January could determine with how much or how little ambition the County moves forward with renewable energy.
DeFors said the task force hopes to submit a grant for electric vehicle charging stations at the County governmental center campus.
“Early on we decided that we should prioritize looking for projects that begin at the county level that can serve as role models for our citizens and businesses,” he said.
The task force views community education and outreach about the importance of renewable energy and energy efficiency as another pillar of their work. Members of the task force have contributed to a free monthly newsletter sent out by Leelanau County Senior Services to approximately 2,000 citizens. Topics covered have included: preparation for a power outage; winter energy efficiency and cost savings; for greatest energy efficiency think energy star, and tips for surviving a power outage. The task force has also facilitated two public education programs at the Leland Township Library, titled “Renewable Energy 101” and “How the Grid Works.”
Lautner, on the other hand, thinks the deluge of information confuses people.
“There’s so much information out there now that’s available at the touch of a button,” she said. “A lot of the general public are feeling inundating by questions of whether we can bring solar to their property.”
