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By Melina Walling and Mary Katherine Wildeman

The Associated Press

PIPER CITY, Ill. 鈥� In Scott Saffer鈥檚 science classroom, kids bake cookies in a decked-out kitchen, care for fish and turtles and a snake, and at times access a workshop full of tools. As the gifted enrichment coordinator at Tri-Point School District, Saffer is living his teaching dream, one he knew he鈥檇 need money to accomplish.

For a while, due to budgetary concerns in rural Ford County, Illinois, he moved to a neighboring school district. But when wind turbines came to town, Tri-Point gained enough funding to bring him back without a pay cut. There, he was one of 10 recipients of a prestigious statewide teaching award last year.

鈥淚t made a huge difference in our budgets,鈥� Saffer said of the nearby wind farm, which went online about five years ago and added almost a million dollars to his school鈥檚 annual operating funds. 鈥淭hose kinds of numbers, they鈥檙e the difference between us being here and not.鈥�

An Associated Press analysis of county tax data from local governments in Illinois, Iowa and Nebraska 鈥� states either with many wind farms or a high potential for wind power 鈥� found wind companies rank among the biggest taxpayers in many rural communities, with their total tax bills at times outstripping that of large farms, power plants and other major businesses. While that tax income from wind power does not represent a significant percentage of counties鈥� budgets, it totals millions of dollars that some local leaders say has translated into meaningful change. But the Sabin Center for Climate Change Law at Columbia University, which tallies local opposition to wind power, finds聽efforts to block wind projects聽are 鈥渨idespread and growing.鈥�

The center鈥檚 June report found 395 local restrictions that could effectively block wind or solar developments 鈥� a 73 percent increase from less than a year ago. Local restrictions have made it harder for wind companies to find places to build even while the U.S.聽has committed to tripling renewables by 2030聽to address climate change.

Local officials, school superintendents, fire chiefs and community college administrators are often among the first to see the economic benefits of wind development in their communities.

Denny Kingren, the fire chief of Paxton, Illinois, says he at first had neither positive nor negative feelings about wind development 鈥� he鈥檇 just seen them crop up throughout Illinois.

Then, about 13 years ago, the funds arrived: about $40,000 a year. That money has since gone toward new trucks, new equipment and more on-call firefighters.

鈥淚t was a true benefit to our fire department,鈥� Kingren said.

This year, Ford County鈥檚 nearly 200 wind turbines account for about 10 percent of the property taxes due to the county 鈥� approximately $3.8 million. AP鈥檚 analysis found wind farms there are three of the top four taxpayers in the county.

Farmland still contributes far more to the county鈥檚 tax base than wind turbines; about聽90 percent of the county is farmland. But wind farms can create an influx of cash for local schools: Tri-Point, where Saffer works, takes in more than $900,000 from the local wind farms annually, representing 15 percent of the school district鈥檚 income from local taxes, according to the district鈥檚 superintendent.

Benefits like growth of local economies 鈥渁re really measurable in places with a lot of installed wind energy capacity,鈥� said David Schwegman, an assistant professor at American University and聽co-author of a 2022 paper聽on wind installations and economic development.

Farmers who sign wind leases can also continue farming most of their land while adding revenue. Some of that money ends up funneled into the community through spending. And wind projects bring jobs 鈥� many temporary or requiring travel, some permanent 鈥� offering a new career path for聽community college students.

Schwegman added, however, that wind development doesn鈥檛 necessarily change some of the long-term forces affecting rural economies. Those areas have been losing residents to cities and suburbs for decades now.

And in some communities, local tax structures mean that a school district won鈥檛 get extra money from wind for several years or even decades. In places like Iowa that have what are called tax increment financing districts, sometimes the county lends money to a wind developer to get a bigger windfall down the line, said Phuong Nguyen, who studies public finance as an associate professor at the University of Iowa.

It鈥檚 a long wait, but when the projects end, school budgets can be boosted by millions of dollars and 鈥渆verybody鈥檚 happy,鈥� Nguyen said. However, he thinks people can be more skeptical in the 20 years before the payoff. He noted that if Iowa tax laws were different, schools could get that money sooner.

Mike Marron, a former Illinois state representative who is now CEO of Vermilion Advantage, his county鈥檚 economic development arm, says the reality of wind鈥檚 benefits hit home about 12 years ago, when the money buoyed the county coffers, which were 鈥渞unning a pretty good budget deficit,鈥� and effectively saved him from having to increase taxes on property owners.

But Marron said the pushback from anti-wind groups was so strong and so polarizing that it took the topic off the table.

鈥淎s an elected official, I felt constrained to not be able to communicate the benefits of it鈥� because of the political reality, he said.

And for the people who don鈥檛 like wind turbines, no amount of investment may supersede the visual reminders of them on a landscape, Schwegman said.

鈥淩enewable energies are ultimately community-based projects,鈥� he said. 鈥淧eople who tend to get negatively impacted by wind turbines tend to be a very hyper-localized group, where the benefits of wind tend to be much more dispersed over larger groups.鈥�

Despite the benefits in Ford County, the local government opted to effectively halt future wind development in 2017 by issuing a moratorium on special-use permits for wind projects, and then instituting strict regulations on where the turbines can be built. Then in 2023 the state Legislature passed a law that limits counties鈥� ability to restrict wind and solar projects, rendering many such local rules invalid,聽according to the Sabin Center.

Saffer said such a move is a 鈥渃ommunity decision,鈥� one that school districts watch closely, knowing they need the money but can鈥檛 interfere.

鈥淚f we didn鈥檛 have that income, we didn’t have this district here, these little towns would just cease being a community,鈥� he said.

But communities are made up of individuals. That鈥檚 why Marron thinks good neighbor agreements, which compensate everyone in each area of wind development whether they have turbines on their property or not, make sense.

鈥淵ou鈥檙e going to notice a check in the mail quicker than you鈥檙e going to notice the fact that your property tax bills aren鈥檛 going up,鈥� Marron said.

Editor鈥檚 note: Associated Press journalist Joshua A. Bickel contributed from Danville, Illinois and Piper City, Illinois. Researcher Rhonda Shafner contributed from New York.