BELLEVILLE – Belleville residents are taking legal action in an attempt to stop 19 acres of woods from being cleared to build a solar farm at a historic cemetery.
Last year, under former Mayor Patty Gregory, the City of Belleville purchased the historic Mount Hope Cemetery in foreclosure for $1 and entered into a lease agreement with solar developers to clear-cut 19 acres of woods at the cemetery to build a solar farm.
Jesse Berger with the Save Mount Hope Committee started a Change.org petition to stop the city from following through with the solar farm project, as construction is expected to begin this month. He and other committee members have since launched a GoFundMe to raise money for legal fees as they challenge the city with a lawsuit recently filed in St. Clair County court.
“The project will materially interfere with the sanctity of Mount Hope, the quality of our local environment, and the future of Belleville. Until the damage is done, there is still hope,” Berger’s petition states. “Mount Hope is one of Belleville’s great hidden gems. What the city has planned for it is just plain wrong.”
With Mayor Jenny Gain Meyer now in office, opponents of the solar farm project hope that with enough public support, city leadership can be swayed to stop the project before the chainsaws start.
“We’re not going down without a fight,” Berger wrote in a petition update. “We’d much rather be fundraising to help fix up the cemetery, but it looks like the only shot we have is bringing this case to court. If the City and solar developers are going to take this land away from us, we’re going to make them work for it.”
Save Mount Hope Committee member Amy Clark wrote in the group’s GoFundMe that “after months of research and careful work, we believe we have built a strong legal case to challenge the project.”
“This fight is about more than one project,” Clark stated. “It’s about protecting the dignity of Mount Hope Cemetery, standing up for transparency in local government, and ensuring our community has a say in decisions that impact our neighborhoods and history.”
