NORTHFIELD — The Selectboard has approved two payment in lieu of taxes (PILOT) agreements with the limited liability companies (LLCs) behind BlueWave Solar’s Northfield projects, totaling $120,252 per year for the next 20 years.
The board approved a $47,292 per year agreement with BWC Pine Meadow Brook LLC and a $72,960 per year agreement with BWC Merriam Brook LLC. Both arrangements are in place for 20 years.
The Selectboard had previously approved PILOT agreements with the LLCs that were calculated at a rate of $15,000 per megawatt direct current (DC), a unit used to measure the total peak power capacity of solar panels before conversion to alternating current (AC). However, Town Counsel Jeffrey Blake said that while he had believed the companies had approved the previous draft, he was informed after the Selectboard had voted that the companies’ approval was of the “boilerplate” language that the agreements included, not the amounts they would have to pay the town.
“Apparently there was a miscommunication, or at least certainly I misconstrued, to the extent that when they said, ‘Yeah, this was all good,’ they meant for the boilerplate and for all the provisions,“ Blake told the board. “You approved it. I sent it back and they said, ‘Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa.'”
Blake said that he, the Board of Assessors, and representatives for BWC Pine Meadow Brook LLC and BWC Merriam Brook LLC discussed the matter further and eventually agreed to reduce the rate from $15,000 per megawatt DC to $12,000 per megawatt DC.
Board of Assessors Clerk Bethany Walker said changing the rate from $15,000 to $12,000 per megawatt DC reduced the amount Northfield would receive from BWC Pine Meadow Brook LLC by $236,000 over the course of the 20-year agreement. The change also reduced the amount from BWC Merriam Brook LLC by a total of $360,000 over the 20-year period.
Selectboard members expressed concern and frustration about the change, and said that it is a big reduction from what the town believed it would be getting.
“To me this feels like a bait and switch,” board member Shane Duclos said.
Walker said that while the amount is less than the town had hoped for, the LLCs had originally requested an even lower rate of $8,000 per megawatt DC, and the $12,000 rate was the absolute lowest the town would agree to.
“I will say, with solar equipment, if you don’t have a PILOT, the equipment depreciates extremely fast,” Walker said, noting that Northfield would receive less and less in taxes based on the LLCs’ assessed valuations. “It would be a lot less for 20 years.”
Town Administrator Andrea Llamas added that in the last meeting between the town and the LLCs, representatives for the companies had been pushing for a rate of $11,000 or $11,500 per megawatt DC, but they eventually agreed to meet the town at $12,000.
“We did hold at [$12,000], which was our absolute hold number from the beginning; we were not going lower than [$12,000],” Llamas said. “So as disappointed as we were to see the number go down, I can’t say that we went lower than we would have gone because we were not.”
After discussion, the Selectboard voted to approve the PILOT agreements with the $15,000 per megawatt DC rate.
