Government overreach

Attached is a Complaint filed today in the Circuit Court of Carroll County by 25 citizens of Carroll County against County Judge David Writer, Carroll County and Nimbus Wind Farm.

Nimbus, a subsidiary of Scout Clean Energy, which is itself a subsidiary of multi-billion dollar, international corporation Brookfield Renewables, has for years planned to construct a set of massive industrial wind turbines over 9,000 acres along the tops of ridges of East Carroll County. Nimbus/Scout has acquired lease agreements with about 15 landowners owning land along County Road 905 and other county roads, giving the company the option to construct over 30 towers, the majority of which will be almost 650 feet tall — taller than any manmade structure in all Arkansas. Those few landowners not only granted Nimbus/Scout the right to construct the industrial size wind turbines on their property, but also waived any claims they might have for harms they might suffer, including personal injuries, damage to their underground water systems and water aquifers from blasting and stormwater runoffs, noise and chemical pollution.

For over a year, area residents have presented the Carroll County Quorum Court with multiple opportunities to adopt reasonable restrictions on the development, such as appropriate setbacks from property lines, their homes and county roads, and to require fire protection systems, noise limits and to take actions to protect against pollution and to protect their water rights. The majority of the members of the Quorum Court, however, have refused such requests because they claim the County would be interfering with the property rights of the few landowners who have signed the Nimbus/Scout lease agreements. Those JPs have ignored the property rights of the remaining residents who will have to live with these massive industrial wind turbines almost in their back yards.

In order to build these wind turbines, Nimbus/Scout has to use the county road system. Those roads have never been capable of handling large and heavy loads. Since 2022 Nimbus/Scout has requested Carroll County to enter into an agreement allowing it to widen, extend and even re-grade the county roads. On September 25, Judge Writer signed such an agreement. That agreement gives Nimbus/Scout almost unlimited power to widen, lengthen and change to grades of county roads as it wishes and for its own benefit, and so much more. Nimbus/ Scout can run utilities along and underneath the roads, tow cars and trucks without permission of the owners, and even develop new roads (and require the County to maintain them afterwards). The agreement even purports to grant Nimbus/Scout immunity from liability for the harms it might cause area residents from its activities.

By this agreement, the County and Nimbus/Scout are trying to take away the property, and personal, rights of the citizens of Carroll County and give them to a foreign owned multibillion dollar corporation.

County Judge Writer claims that this is the only way the County can protect the roads from being torn up by Nimbus/Scout and the taxpayers having to foot the bill to fix them.

That’s not true. Judge Writer had the authority to impose reasonable weight and use restrictions on the county roads. These roads have filled the needs of Carroll County citizens for decades, some over a hundred years. It’s surprising there have not been weight and size limits put on them already. Instead, Judge Writer and the County sided with a big corporation against its own citizens.

This lawsuit has been filed by our attorney, Matt Bishop, to protect the rights of Carroll County citizens from their own government’s overreach and from a foreign- owned business more interested in greenbacks than green energy.

— Concerned Citizens of the Ozarks