Paxton council, plan commission agree on wind turbines

PAXTON – The Paxton City Council concurred with a plan commission recommendation for new city restrictions on where wind turbines can be built outside city limits. Now turbines cannot be put up within half a mile of the city limits on Paxton's northeast side or within one mile of the city's other three sides. Previously, under a Ford County ordinance, turbines could be built as close as 1,500 feet to the city.

Paxton-Buckley-Loda school board president Mike Short told the commission the school district could live with the restrictions because the ordinance provides for a waiver procedure should the district or the city itself decide to put up a turbine on its own property. And Short has been reassured that E.On Climate & Renewables, a wind-energy company planning to put turbines on the city's northeast side, would be able to install all the turbines it has planned.

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