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Aerial drone view of solar panels at a solar energy generation farm at Sunset in South Wales, UK

A Douglas County judge has ruled that planning commissioners produce a feasible set of documents within a month in the ongoing legal dispute over a proposed 159-megawatt solar farm in northern Douglas County.

On Tuesday, Judge James McCabria ruled that Lawrence-Douglas County Planning Commissioners who received subpoenas in a case involving the Kansas Sky Energy Center move forward with a production of documents. Those documents must be produced within 30 days.

The plaintiffs in the case – Grant Township alongside affected property owners and local associations – wanted planning commissioners to provide all documents containing one of 23 terms – such as agrivoltaic, local concern, crew, Grant, Township, Kansas Sky, Free State Solar, solar reg., battery storage and data center.

However, Michelle Stewart, an attorney representing the planning commissioners, argued that the long list of terms were far too broad and could capture large amounts of irrelevant personal information.

Stewart argued that requiring them to review all those results would create an unreasonable burden, particularly because those commissioners were not defendants in the lawsuit.

McCabria said the planning commissioners could provide a narrower production of documents, but they must create a written explanation describing the irrelevant information excluded from production and affirm that they have no reason to believe they withheld relevant documents.

Once the documents from the planning commissioners are produced, the plaintiffs can ask the court to consider whether further discovery is necessary.

Officials with Grant Township – which would be home to the solar project – wanted to obtain records from the planning commissioners because despite a prior court order requiring Douglas County to produce certain materials, they argue that the county continues to provide incomplete and inadequate responses.

Specifically the plaintiffs said emails and text messages between planning commissioners have not been properly turned over. However, Douglas County has argued that county commissioners and planning commissioners are in different areas of government.

As the Journal-World reported, in June, McCabria said Grant Township may pursue records from planning commissioners through subpoenas as part of its lawsuit against Douglas County regarding its approval of a planned commercial solar farm.

“The court instructed us to send non-party subpoenas out, so that’s what we did,” Quentin Templeton, an attorney representing Grant Township, said.

When the subpoenas were issued to planning commissioners, Stewart was appointed as counsel for Planning Commissioners Steve Munch, Gary Rexroad, David Carrttar, Pedro Borroto, Sharon Ashworth and Prasanth Duvvur. All six served on the Planning Commission when it voted on the conditional use permit for the solar farm – which the commission ultimately rejected.

In response to the subpoenas issued to planning commissioners, Stewart objected and filed motions to quash all of them.

Templeton expressed frustration and said he felt like the plaintiffs and defendants in the case were going in “a giant circle.”

“I don’t know how to get the stuff that I need,” Templeton said. “I don’t know what to do.”

Not only did the plaintiffs subpoena the planning commissioners, they also subpoenaed the Douglas County commissioners, County Administrator Sarah Plinsky and former County Planner Mary Miller.

“I filed a motion to quash that, and objections to the requests themselves,” Terelle Mock, an attorney representing Douglas County, said.

In a filing from July 28, Mock said “all documents responsive to discovery already served (including text messages) for these individuals have already been searched and produced. Mary Miller was included in all previous searches because of her role supporting the Planning Commission.”

“At this point, this is harassment,” Mock said. “This is digging in and not letting go.”

“We’ve done our due diligence,” Mock said.

McCabria said he did not recall that individual Douglas County commissioners and county staff were part of the subpoena process he had directed at the previous hearing, and he said more review would be needed to determine how to proceed with those specifically.

McCabria said he hopes to determine whether the new subpoenas seek information that should already have been produced through the county’s previous discovery responses or whether they improperly expand the scope of what was originally requested.

Grant Township, alongside affected property owners and local associations, are suing Douglas County over its approval of the Kansas Sky Energy Center – a massive 159-megawatt solar farm planned for farm fields near the Midland Junction area of northern Douglas County. The lawsuit was filed in 2024, and currently a temporary injunction is in place halting construction.

Since the project has been unable to proceed with the lawsuit, earlier this year, county commissioners approved a one-year extension on its conditional use permit. The conditional use permit was originally approved by commissioners in 2024, and the extension sets a new expiration date of April 13, 2027.

Under Douglas County zoning regulations, a conditional use permit “shall become null and void” if a project hasn’t started or obtained a building permit within two years of its approval. However, applicants may request a one-year extension before it expires. The code does not allow additional extensions to be considered.

McCabria said he will try to make additional rulings prior to an already scheduled pretrial conference scheduled for Sept. 23. The trial is currently scheduled to begin at the end of November and continue into early December.