These hills will soon be covered with these grotesque towers; ruining the landscape that created a vision of what life was like on the prairie many years ago. Along these Benton County highways there were only telephone poles, barns, homes, and an occasional wooded area; thus allowing an unobstructed view of the horizon in all directions.

Rich Porter of rural Paxton said he believes that Ford County, like other counties, has relied too much on information supplied by wind energy representatives. Porter is convinced that wind farms could have a negative impact on the county land values, taxes and zoning issues. "Wind farms are not what they look like on the surface; they have many twists and turns," he warned during the public comment period at the board's Monday meeting.

A meeting to gauge public opposition to wind farms in Boone County is scheduled for 7 p.m. Feb. 19 at the Boone County Farm Bureau Community Building at the 4-H Fairgrounds, 1300 East County Road 100 South, Lebanon.

Within the next few years, dozens of wind turbines could be erected in Randolph County ... Indianapolis attorney Christopher (Kit) Earle, of Bose McKinney & Evans, advised farmers attending the meeting that land lease payments were just one issue they should address in a contract with energy companies. Other issues include access roads to the wind turbine for construction, operation and maintenance; soil compaction; escalation of lease payments to take inflation into account during the 20- to 40-year life span of the wind farm; underground electrical cables and their impact on cultivation and drainage tiles; fixed payments versus royalties or percentage of revenues from a wind farm; negotiating as a group because of safety-in-numbers advantages; and decommissioning turbines when they are no longer useful.