LETTER: Emails show Holland board’s involvement in solar farm plan

To Ozaukee Press:

I am writing to give your readers an update on my fight against the undemocratic and un-American solar farm deal between Brooklyn’s Ranger Power and the Town of Holland Board.

Ranger Power solar company walked down my driveway in December 2019 and announced they were installing 20,000 solar panels in the farmer’s field surrounding our rural farmhouse. When I went to our Town Board meeting and asked if they could help me, they replied in unison: “We know nothing. You probably know more than we do. We can’t help you.”

Through Wisconsin’s Freedom of Information Act, my group and I have obtained over 400 documents related to the Town of Holland Board and Ranger Power. In these documents we have discovered the following proof of what is going on:

The Town Board was secretly corresponding with Ranger Power rep

Jeff Rauh in October 2019 about a joint development agreement with Ranger Power shepherding the board on what to do, offering them a stencil of an agreement they drafted for a Badger Solar deal in

Jefferson, Wis.

 Town Board members were having lunch or dinner with Ranger Power reps in early 2019.

Ranger Power held a secret meeting with all prospective farmers and landowners in early 2019. Shortly after this meeting, Ranger Power began secretly signing land leases with landowners.

In 2019, the Town of Holland board discussed numerous details about the logistics of the project with Ranger Power informing them about ordinances that could block solar development.

I will be posting many of these emails as evidence of corruption in our town government on our Facebook group site “Stop the Onion River Project.”

Meanwhile, the district attorney of Sheboygan County informed me that he is investigating my complaint against the Town of Holland Board for violations of the Open Meetings Law.
                                                       

Ellen Tachick
Oostburg