Dorchester Times: Huge Wind Farm Appears Destined For Saline County

Wednesday, July 27, 2016

Huge Wind Farm Appears Destined For Saline County

Whoosh. Whoosh. Whoosh.

If you live near Milligan, on the Saline County side, that's a sound you may need to get used to.

According to the Lincoln Journal Star, Aksamit Resource Management (a wind energy corporation) won its bid Tuesday for a special use permit to build 37 wind turbines in Saline County, the first of three wind farms it plans for the state.

The county board voted 3-0 to approve it, despite concerns. Commissioners Marvin Kohout and Stephanie Krivohlavek abstained from voting, Kohout because he owns land contiguous to the project and Krivohlavek because she has family that could benefit from it.

The Lincoln paper's story goes as follows: "Following more than two hours of public comment that pitted neighbor against neighbor, Saline County Commissioners granted the permit requested by Aksamit Resource Management for a 74 megawatt wind farm the company plans to built northeast of Milligan."

According to the Journal Star, Aksamit plans to spend $110 million to build 37 turbines, each 440 feet tall when blades are at their highest point, said Michael Matheson, the company’s vice president of retail and municipal sales.

The story notes that wind turbines have been a contentious issue for Nebraskans in recent years.

"Christine McClain and her husband, Gary, bought land five months ago and spent their savings building a new home that will now be flanked by turbines. She said her dreams of a peaceful life in the country have been ruined. She fears the whoosh-thump of the turbines will cause her headaches and other ailments.

“Had I known this was going to happen, I would not have purchased my property. I’m furious,” she said.

3 comments:

AnonymousJuly 27, 2016 at 9:14 PM
who gets to pay for them to come down in 5-10 yrs when the obama subsidies are gone and we are powering our home at the source?
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AnonymousJuly 27, 2016 at 10:27 PM
Has anybody stated where the generated power will be sold?
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AnonymousJuly 28, 2016 at 6:23 PM
Well this blows. I feel sorry for those who will see that atrocity every day.
ReplyDelete
Replies

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Dorchester: A Good Little Family Town

Dorchester, Nebraska (est. population 630) is located in northern Saline county. Close in proximity to Interstate 80, Dorchester is only 25 minutes from the state capital of Lincoln (est. population 250,000) and about 55 minutes from Omaha (metro population 725,000).

Dorchester's median resident age is 37 years. In 2005, Dorchester had a median family income of approximately $35,600. The median house value was about $63,000. About 95 percent of Dorchester residents commute to work via Interstate and highways.

The village has a quality public school, which received a $4.1 million expansion and modernization in 2008; it offers a small classrooms and individualized attention. Total enrollment of grades K-12 is around 230-250 students.

Ancestries of the Dorchester area are primarily German (42.4%), Czech (24.9%), Irish (12.5%), English (5.4%), and Dutch (4.9%).

Dorchester Historical Facts

* On July 4, 1871, the railroad reached Dorchester.
* Incorporated in 1881, Dorchester's population grew from 200 to 500 by 1882.
* In 1882, Dorchester had 90 buildings, 35 of which were businesses or public facilities. Brick buildings lined both sides of Washington Avenue for two blocks.
* Dorchester's longest-running newspaper was The Dorchester Star, which was published until the late 1940s.
* By 1889, Dorchester's population is said to have reached 800, while the town housed an opera house, a two-story brick schoolhouse with a bell tower, and four churches.
* By the 1910s, Dorchester had electricity, a water tower and a fire department.
* Dorchester's main arteries, Highways 6 and 33, were graveled in the 1940s.
* Dorchester's first irrigation well was drilled on Chris Weber's farm and rural electrification was finished following WWII.

A Village with History

Dorchester is one of the "alphabet towns" on the Burlington & Missouri River Railroad line built west from Lincoln. The town site was selected for its pleasant location in the northern part of Saline County, about eight miles west of Crete. This situation is an attractive one, being on the level prairie land, midway between the West Blue River and Turkey Creek. The first named stream is three miles north, and the latter about the same distance south from the town. Dorchester was platted in 1870 and incorporated in 1881. The name "Dorchester" came from either for a suburb of Boston by that name or a town in England. No one is sure. Two of the very first settlers were James Seely and Edward McIntyre, who both made Dorchester their permanent home.

Dorchester: In The Beginning

Here is a look at Dorchester around 1890, less than a decade after its official incorporation, as documented by Andreas' History of the State of Nebraska:
* POPULATION: "About 300, and is made up of a substantial and progressive class of citizens, who are moral and industrious. ... The town grew but very little until the year 1879, for the reason that Pleasant Hill, on Turkey Creek, a short distance south, was the county seat and naturally drew a trade for quite a large scope of country."
* BUSINESS: "The business and professional interests of the town are represented by three general merchandise stores, two drug, one grocery, one furniture, two hardware, and two millinery stores, one bank, two restaurants, two hotels, three livery stables, a post office, one newspaper office, two elevators, two lumber yards, two coal yards, two blacksmith shops, two lawyers and four physicians."
* SCHOOL: "The schoolhouse is a good one. The schoolhouse was built in 1872, since which time the public schools have been continually kept up. The present schoolhouse is 24' x 40' in size, two stories high. The school is graded and consists of three departments. The house is found too small, and arrangements will soon be made to increase its size."
* CHURCHES: "There are three substantial churches."
* HOMES: "The residence portion of the village is made up of neat houses of different styles of architecture, but none of them very large."
* NEWSPAPER: "The Dorchester Star, which was established August 21, 1881, by H. C. Bittenbender, who edited it until January 19, 1882, when he sold it to Ryerson & Bullock, the present proprietors. The Star is a bright weekly paper, five-column quarto, in size, and is Republican in politics."