Farmers Weekly Review

Bully pulpit: A term coined by President Teddy Roosevelt which meant a terrific platform to advocate an agenda, as paraphrased from Wikipedia.
Speaking of presidents and elections, it is almost impossible to have an election without there being claims of election interference.
Since this is an election year, I thought the Will County Fair would be a nice venue to have a quick and informal vote to see if the average fairgoer would be interested in the idea of an agricultural preservation program for Will County. A simple sign was made asking, “Would you support a farmland preservation program in Will County?” All the voters had to do was select a kernel of corn from a basket and deposit in a particular jar for yes or no.
Within 24 hours, there was election interference. Unsupervised children were the culprit. They did not stuff the ballot box, instead they discovered they could steal the corn kernel ballots and feed them to the baby animals on display at the petting zoo.
The voting was suspended and the display removed for the animals’ safety. However, there was some evidence of how the public felt with one day of voting in the ballot box/mason jars. I estimated the “yes” jar had at least 10-15 times more votes than the “no” jar. I hope you did not really expect me to count all those kernels.
What does this mean?
If you have attended a public hearing before the county zoning commission involving solar facility sitings and other large-scale land conversions, you would have heard a common theme among residents who speak in opposition to such requests:
“We moved to the country for the open space and fields, and we do not want it to change.” Yet, there is no mechanism in place to prevent change. Do they expect another person to provide the amenities they desire willingly and for free?
Now if I may, it is time for my bully pulpit. Another common request among those opposed to solar farms in rural areas is to put solar panels on large roofs and over parking lots instead.
Without belaboring the many reasons why I believe this is not common, I will focus on one: Much of the renewable energy growth is driven by mandates, incentives and subsidies. Perhaps the public should demand their political leaders do what it takes to make those locations, roofs and parking lots more attractive and financially lucrative to the companies investing in solar energy electrical production than open space and farmland.
I have been slowly working to gather support for some sort of program that would allow farmland preservation in Will County. I remember about 30 years ago when I was told there were only about 50,000 acres of farmland left in Cook County. Today, thanks to an internet connection that is crawling slower than traffic on Interstate 80 through Joliet, the best estimate I can find with a google search is 11,000 acres of farmland left in Cook County.
The internet also claims there are about 801 farmers with 216,000 acres of farmland in Will County. How long until that number is 11,000?
Is it possible that some day in Will County there will no longer be any fields for a farmer to be outstanding in?