Opponents of solar farm at Mount Hope Cemetery launch campaign to stop it
More than 450 people have signed a petition asking Belleville officials to halt their plans to clear-cut woods behind Mount Hope Cemetery to make way for a community solar farm.
Opponents are hoping that the new administration of Mayor Jenny Meyer, who defeated former Mayor Patty Gregory in April, will be more open to their concerns about what’s planned for the city-owned property.
They acknowledge that the campaign comes late in the game. Officials already have signed a contract to lease 25 acres (about the size of 12 city blocks) to a solar company for 25 years.
“Until the chainsaws start, there is still hope for this cemetery’s future,” states the petition, which was posted in early May on Change.org by Jesse Berger, 39, who lives nearby.
Berger and other opponents argue that such a large tract of green space and wildlife habitat in a heavily-developed urban area should be used for a community park or nature preserve and that a solar farm would destroy the sanctity and character of the historic cemetery.
The petition calls Mount Hope, known for its towering trees and rolling hills, “one of Belleville’s great hidden gems.”
“What the city has planned for it is just plain wrong,” it states. “It’s bad enough that any woods are being opportunistically cleared for solar, but this project is at a public cemetery.”
The controversy has many layers, prompting disagreements between families with loved ones buried at Mount Hope, accusations that city decision-making lacked transparency and questions about the environmental commitment of solar companies.
Surveying is now underway. The construction timeline depends on migration patterns of birds and bats, according to Rachael Cornick, director of operations for the solar developer, Texas-based Shine Development Partners.
“The project is still on track to be completed sometime next year,” she said.
Rent is $69,375 a year
It’s believed that nearly 27,000 people are buried at Mount Hope, which dates back to the late 1800s. The most recent owner abandoned it about 20 years ago while being accused of scamming people on prepaid funeral arrangements. That led to receivership and neglect.
In July, the city bought 132 acres of Mount Hope land from a state receiver for $1 in a St. Clair County foreclosure auction. About 55 acres of burial grounds, off West Main Street, are backed by woods.
Around the same time, officials agreed to lease 25 acres to Belleville Solar LLC, a company owned by Shine, for $69,375 a year and use the money to offset the $100,000 a year the city has been spending to mow and otherwise maintain the cemetery.
“I just think it’s a solution to a problem,” Gregory said last year.
Representatives of Shine and StraightUp Solar, which would install the 5-megawatt system, told residents at a December meeting that a revised design was more wildlife-friendly and that a buffer zone of trees would hide it from public view. One neighbor called that “laughable.”
The “community” part of the solar farm means it will allow low- to moderate-income residents to get a 20% discount on electricity costs and other “subscribers” to get a 10% discount, according to officials.
Last week, Mayor Meyer said opponents hadn’t yet submitted the petition to her office. She reiterated the fact that the city had entered into a legally-binding lease agreement.
“I’m not sure if they want the city to get out of the lease and then they just expect the taxpayers and the city to take a loss on taking over the cemetery,” she said. “I’m not sure what they’re asking for.”
The city has owned and operated another cemetery, Walnut Hill Cemetery, since 1850. It spent more than $300,000 on its operation last year, after subtracting revenue from burial and plot fees.
Grant tied to location
Solar-farm opponents argue that a vacant parking lot or flat, open field would be better suited for the project than the wooded area behind Mount Hope, which includes steep terrain leading down to Schoenberger Creek.
However, Shine’s involvement was contingent on a $2 million “grant” (incentive package of renewable-energy credits) awarded by the state of Illinois. A location change would cancel it, said Cornick, the director of operations.
In recent months, Shine and StraightUp Solar have found themselves in the unusual position of having to defend a project that involves cutting down thousands of trees. The companies generally are aligned with progressive efforts to increase renewable energy.
“We are environmentalists, and our preference is not to cut down trees, ever,” Cornick said. “We do not want to do that. But we didn’t choose the property (at Mount Hope). That was the city’s decision.”
At one time, former owners cleared much of the land where the solar farm is planned, so it isn’t considered “old growth” forest, according to Cornick. Berger, the petition author, said satellite maps show some areas have been forested since at least the 1940s while younger trees are about 25 years old.
Shine is promising to acquire land elsewhere that is equal in size but more ecologically “valuable” and preserve it in a land trust as part of a mitigation plan, Cornick said, but it won’t be in the Belleville area because no such property is available.
“It would be within the Mississippi River Valley,” she said.
Berger said Google Maps aerial views of the Belleville region show that the vast majority of woods have been cleared for farmland and residential and commercial development, increasing the importance of preserving Mount Hope land for local benefit.
The incentive package is part of the Illinois Shines program, also known as the Adjustable Block Program, implemented by the Illinois Power Agency. The independent state agency declined to make its legal representative available for a phone interview.
Rift in Friends group
Berger has been promoting the “Save Mount Hope” petition with help from Natalie Wilson, 60, of Belleville, who has about 40 relatives buried in the cemetery. She’s co-administrator of the Facebook page for a group called Friends of Mount Hope Cemetery that has nearly 200 members.
“I grew up walking around the cemetery with my grandmother and my dogs,” Wilson said. “I still eat lunch here. It’s my go-to, peaceful place.”
Wilson’s opposition to the solar farm has caused a rift with E. Gayle Schneider, 78, who founded the Friends group 11 years ago from her home in Greenville, North Carolina.
Schneider plans to be buried at Mount Hope, next to her mother and grandmother. Her ultimate goal is establishing a non-profit foundation that could accept donations for cemetery maintenance.
“I’m willing to bequeath close to half a million dollars,” Schneider said.
For the past two years, Schneider has been conferring with Belleville officials, solar-company representatives and the Mount Hope receiver. She strongly supported the city’s purchase of the cemetery to insure its long-term stability, even if it meant using some land for a solar farm.
Schneider’s solo involvement created the false impression that other cemetery families felt the same way, according to Wilson.
“A lot of people didn’t even know about it,” she said.
Schneider said Mount Hope had problems with tall grass, vandalism and trash dumping before the city took over maintenance in 2010, and no one else in the Friends group or neighborhood offered any solutions.
Schneider called Belleville’s ownership “the best of all possible worlds.”
“But the city only took it on when they thought that they had a plan to basically use some of the unused land in the back of the cemetery (for a solar farm) to finance its upkeep,” she said.
Schneider said one person who had expressed an interest in buying Mount Hope last year leases property from nearby Mount Carmel Cemetery, which is privately owned, for a dirt-hauling business that has badly scarred the landscape. He ultimately didn’t bid in the foreclosure auction.
Schneider said she was “blindsided” when she saw a link to Berger’s petition on the Friends Facebook page.
“It’s fine and good to put out a petition and oppose this, but that should have been done last year,” Schneider said. “The horse has left the barn (on the solar farm). It’s not ideal, but it’s a means to an end.”
Transparency issues
News that the Gregory administration was considering a plan to buy Mount Hope’s 132 acres and allow construction of a solar farm in its back woods went public a year and a half ago.
About 10 people, mostly neighbors, spoke against the proposal at a Belleville Zoning Board of Appeals meeting in December 2023 and a Belleville City Council meeting in January 2024. They argued that it would destroy a scenic natural area full of wildlife and negatively affect the cemetery and neighborhood.
Aldermen voted 14-1 to approve a special-use permit for a solar farm but assured opponents it wasn’t a done deal.
“The chainsaws don’t start tomorrow,” Ward 7 Alderman Phil Elmore said at the time.
The administration called a special City Council meeting in April 2024 to move forward on the Mount Hope plan, a week before a regular meeting, stating that it was necessary due to a state deadline faced by the solar company. The vote was 12-0 with four aldermen absent.
The audience included one citizen, James Clarida. Afterward, he said the decision had been rushed through without adequate public notice or input.
The city bought Mount Hope at a foreclosure auction in July with the blessing of receiver Sara Wooley, who pointed to its experience operating a cemetery. Officials signed a lease with Belleville Solar LLC the same day, according to Cross, the economic development director.
The city’s main goal has been to find a solution to Mount Hope’s problems, which it inherited, and make improvements “out of respect for the families that have loved ones there,” he said this week.
“I’m not speaking for the mayor, but until I hear differently, as far as I’m concerned, the city is still committed and moving forward with the (solar farm),” Cross said. “I guess the council could stop it or try to get out of the lease, but that’s a legal question.”
The Illinois Shines program is designed to help the state meet its renewable-energy targets. It requires the public to be involved in development of community solar farms.
To meet that requirement, city officials and representatives of Shine and StraightUp Solar held a public meeting on the Mount Hope project in September. An estimated 30 residents attended. Berger described it as “contentious,” with many people voicing concerns.
“For the most part, people were not happy,” Berger said.
‘Animal-friendly’ changes
Cornick, the developer’s director of operations, said Shine and StraightUp Solar took feedback from the first public meeting seriously and acted on it. At a second meeting in December, they unveiled a new solar-farm design.
The design replaced one large uniform section with three smaller sections that follow the area’s “natural topography,” moved solar arrays farther from the creek bed and included “animal-friendly” fencing and thoroughfares for wildlife, according to Cornick.
“They’re trying to do the best that they can to make it a system that works for everybody while minimally impacting the nature of that cemetery,” Cross said. “We hear everybody’s concerns, and we respect everybody’s concerns, but we’re pretty far down the line on this project now.”
Materials at both meetings listed Laborers’ International Union of North America Local 549 as a “team member” in the Mount Hope project, noting that the solar farm would be constructed with union labor.
Wilson, the Friends member, said some attendees were angered by the announcement that vehicles involved in clear-cutting, construction and maintenance would go through the cemetery to reach the solar farm. Cornick said officials couldn’t find a workable secondary route.
“We were like, ‘Boo, hiss, you’re not driving through our cemetery with your big trucks,’” Wilson said.
During early discussions, Ward 4 Alderman Raffi Ovian, who has family buried in Mount Hope, had expressed concern that large, heavy vehicle traffic could damage cemetery roads and disrupt the tranquil setting.
Shine is promising to improve the roads after an expected three or four months of construction. Cornick and Cross said follow-up maintenance would be minimal, requiring trucks no bigger than those used for burials.
Cross called the road improvements an unexpected “bonus.”
“I’m not crazy about solar farms,” Ovian said last week. “I (voted for the Mount Hope project) only because of the additional revenue to the city. The cemetery is in need of help. They need improvements, not only to their roads but also to the mausoleum and the chapel.”
Another public meeting is expected to be held soon, Cross said. A date hasn’t been finalized.
Berger, the petition author, said he regrets that he didn’t get involved earlier.
“The idea of clear-cutting a cemetery seemed unreal,” he said, speaking of his reaction when someone put a flyer on his door last year. “I just figured that citizens would rise up and say they disagreed with it, that it was a bad idea, and (the city) would pull the plug.”
This story was originally published June 2, 2025 at 6:00 AM.
