Schuylkill commissioners to update county zoning ordinance

In 2010, when the Schuylkill County Zoning Ordinance was last revised, business ventures such as natural gas compression stations, growing and dispensing facilities for medical marijuana and wind turbines were not on the radar.

During a workshop meeting Wednesday, the Schuylkill County Commissioners adopted a resolution declaring the county’s zoning ordinance “to be substantively invalid with respect to the use of property for the establishment and operation” of those business ventures. It’s a necessary step which buys the county time — 180 days — to develop a curative amendment to the existing ordinance.

The 180-day time span was established by the Pennsylvania General Assembly in 1968 as the necessary period needed to include development and review by county planners, public comment and official adoption of the revision. During the meeting, county solicitor Glenn Roth said that county officials have been reviewing the existing county zoning ordinance for about a year, seeing “no provision anywhere” for those ventures. During those 180 days, Roth explained, no permits will be issued for those uses.

In recent weeks, Tower City resident Virginia Morton had spoken during the public comment portion of commissioners’ meetings to express her concern about a potential wind turbine project in her area. Morton said that a company called Clean Air Generation had leased 12,672 acres owned by Rausch Creek LLC lands, which include acreage in Hegins and Porter townships.

Porter Township uses the county zoning ordinance; Hegins Township has its own. Morton said that the project could encompass four townships and include 75 to 100 wind turbines. During a meeting last month, Hegins Township also adopted a resolution declaring its zoning ordinance “substantively invalid” and has 180 days to create a new ordinance.

After the meeting, Morton shook hands with the commissioners. Commissioners’ Chairman George Halcovage said that there were “a lot of things to be looking at” in the existing ordinance.

“We felt that the timing was good for a broad review,” Halcovage said, after crediting the county’s engineering, legal and administrative teams. “There are many new technologies out there.”