By HOLLY GASKILL
At the close of their regular meeting Monday, Wells County Commissioner Jeff Stringer addressed Saturday’s News-Banner story about reported death threats the commissioners have received related to solar issues.
“There’s an article that should say, in my eyes, I heard a rumor — that’s what I think it should be. It brought up issues that people involved did not bring up, and I think it’s reckless,” Stringer began. He later stated that he used “rumor” to describe that the reports had not come directly from the commissioners, not that they were false.
“In today’s society — with all the issues going on and the conflict between parties, conflict between people — the last thing we need to do is bring up an issue that’s not an issue in this county,” Stringer said. “We’re all one group of people, who might have differing views of how we see things playing out, but we should not give credit to any violence. We should not give names to anybody that perpetrates violence. This is (not) things we should talk about — doesn’t mean we hide from them, but I don’t think when they’re not an issue, it should be brought up.”
He continued, “To the paper, I would ask at this point, is the paper — I’m asking this to George (Witwer), the owner — is the paper something in this county that reflects the news, or is the paper a tabloid, where we’re going to take rumors and innuendos and move them forward and we don’t have the information? If it’s beneficial to the bulk of the good, let’s do it. But if it’s just to stir conflict — which I believe, in my opinion, this is Jeff Stringer’s opinion — that’s what that is. The people that reported it didn’t have the whole story. The people that brought it to the paper didn’t have the whole story. It’s not a story. If it were a story, it would have been investigated, when someone put a pipe bomb in my mailbox — that’s when it should be a story.”
Three Wells County residents with land leased to a solar development — Paul Mills, Tony Mills and Don Avey — reported a September conversation in which Stringer had discussed receiving death threats made on solar-related issues. Sheriff Scott Holliday also said he was aware of threats made, and that Stringer’s mailbox had been “blown up” about two years prior in an unrelated, unsolved incident.
Stringer had declined to comment on the reports, and Commissioner Mike Vanover had stated the following: “I have received every kind of communication that you can imagine and they were all handled with the attention they deserved.” Commissioner Blake Gerber did not respond for comment.
holly@news-banner.com
