As Fayette Co. Mulls Battery Tax Abatement, Lee Votes One Down

The Lee County Commissioners Court voted last Monday to deny a tax abatement for a battery storage project there.

Their vote comes just ahead of a tax abatement hearing by the Fayette County Commissioners Court later this week for a battery storage project in Warda.

Solvent Energy Inc. had applied for a tax abatement from Lee County for a 150 megawatt battery storage facility next to a power substation near the town of Lincoln.

“In the end, we voted against authorizing a tax reinvestment zone, and that basically put the tax abatement out of reach,” Lee County Judge Frank J. Malinak III.

Malinak said the Court voted unanimously.

“This is a rural county,” Malinak said. “We’ve got working class people here. I don’t think anyone wants to give a tax abatement to anyone coming in here unless there’s some public need or public advantage. I feel the same way. There needs to be some advantage for the public.”

He said the Court in Lee County might consider a tax abatement for projects that increased jobs like manufacturing or provided a public service like health care.

Malinak and two other Lee County commissioners attended the community meeting in Warda last Thursday about the battery project there.

At that meeting, a retired energy executive from Lee County, Stefaan Sercu, spoke in favor of tax abatements as a way for local governments to place conditions on the development of battery storage facilities, such as safeguards against disaster, noise or decommissioning concerns.

Malinak said counties should not have to make tax deals with companies in order to ensure their communities are protected.

“We are going to go to the Legislature and get that changed,” Malinak said. “Take for instance decommissioning bonds. The state requires solar farms and wind farms to have decommissioning bonds. But nothing is required for battery farms, from what I understand.

“That has absolutely got to be changed. It should not be up to a county to have to give a tax abatement to ensure that a for-profit energy storage company is going to come in and clean up their mess if things go bad. That should not fall on the shoulders of the county.”

Fayette County Commissioners will hold a public hearing over the proposed tax abatement for the Staccato Storage battery project in Warda at a meeting this Thursday, Aug. 22, at 9 a.m. inside the Fayette County Ag Building, located at 255 Svoboda Ln. in La Grange.