Indiana

Buying Land in Randolph County, Indiana

Seat Winchester, in east-central Indiana on the Ohio border. Randolph County zones countywide through its Area Planning Commission, and its southwest corner is home to Riverstart Solar Park -- the state's largest solar facility -- built under a first-of-its-kind pollinator-habitat ordinance that the county has since used to say no to a later, nearby phase.

Countywide Zoning Through an Area Planning Commission

Generally favorable

Randolph County's thirteen-member Area Planning Commission administers a Unified Zoning Ordinance and Subdivision Control Ordinance covering the county.

Home to Indiana's Largest Solar Facility -- Under a Distinctive Local Ordinance

Case-by-case / verify locally

Riverstart Solar Park (200 MW, ~1,400 acres, EDP Renewables) sits in the county's southwest corner under a 2020 ordinance requiring pollinator-friendly groundcover. See our dedicated wind and solar leasing page for how the county later denied a nearby expansion phase.

Septic Through a Direct County Health Department

Generally favorable

The Randolph County Health Department permits on-site sewage systems, working alongside the Area Planning Commission's Improvement Location Permit process for new construction.

Zoning: a thirteen-member Area Planning Commission covers the whole county

Randolph County has adopted county-wide zoning, administered by a thirteen-member Area Planning Commission that meets monthly to review zoning-change requests, subdivision proposals, and planned-development-district applications, and that maintains the county's Unified Zoning Ordinance, Subdivision Control Ordinance, Comprehensive Plan, and official zoning maps. For a new home on a septic system, the Improvement Location Permit process requires septic approval up front, tying the Area Planning Commission's permitting sequence directly to the county Health Department's separate septic-approval process described further below.

A buyer evaluating a standard residential or agricultural parcel in Randolph County will generally find this a fairly conventional Indiana county-zoning experience. Where it gets more complicated -- and where confirming current rules directly really matters -- is anywhere near the county's southwest corner, where the state's largest solar facility has driven a genuinely unusual and still-evolving set of local ordinance amendments, covered in detail below and in our dedicated wind and solar leasing page.

Riverstart Solar Park: Indiana's largest solar facility, and a first-of-its-kind local ordinance

In July 2020, Randolph County Commissioners voted unanimously to adopt a new solar-siting ordinance specifically to accommodate Riverstart Solar Park -- a roughly $242 million, 200-megawatt project developed by EDP Renewables across roughly 1,400 acres in the county's southwest corner, with about 670,000 solar panels. What made the ordinance distinctive enough for national trade-press coverage wasn't the project's size alone; it was a mandatory land-stewardship provision requiring the groundcover under and around Riverstart's panels (and any future solar project in the county) to be native meadow grasses and pollinator-friendly wildflower forbs and clover, rather than the mowed turf grass typical of most solar installations at the time. Reporting described it as Indiana's first solar ordinance with this kind of pollinator-habitat mandate, and the completed project has since incorporated sheep grazing on part of the site as well, an agrivoltaic combination of solar generation and continued agricultural use on the same acreage.

Riverstart began commercial operation in 2021 and was, at the time, the largest solar facility in the state by generating capacity. The project didn't stop there: EDP Renewables completed a further 100-megawatt, Amazon-backed phase (Riverstart III) in April 2025, part of a reported three-phase build-out totaling roughly 300 megawatts, and has discussed a further roughly $250 million, 150-megawatt Riverstart IV. See our dedicated wind and solar leasing page for Randolph County for the fuller phase-by-phase picture, including a separate, distinct project the county actually turned down.

Septic, GIS, and other departments to know

For a standard septic system on unincorporated Randolph County land, the Randolph County Health Department issues the permit -- an application accompanied by a plat of property is required, and the department's recommendations follow Indiana State Board of Health guidelines, consistent with the statewide ISDH 410 IAC 6-8.3 framework used across Indiana. As noted above, a new septic-dependent home also needs an Improvement Location Permit through the Area Planning Commission, so the two processes typically run together rather than being fully independent of each other.

The Randolph County Assessor's office ((765) 584-2427) handles parcel valuation and property records, and the County Recorder ((765) 584-7300) holds deeds, easements, and plats -- including any recorded solar-lease easement, worth checking directly for a parcel anywhere near the Riverstart project area or elsewhere in the county's active solar-development corridor.

What we could and couldn't confirm

Riverstart Solar Park's core facts (200 MW, ~1,400 acres, ~670,000 panels, roughly $242 million cost, EDP Renewables as developer, 2021 commercial operation, and the July 2020 pollinator-habitat ordinance) are corroborated across Solar Power World, the Hoosier Environmental Council, and Winchester News Gazette reporting, which is stronger sourcing than a single article. The Riverstart III (100 MW, April 2025, Amazon-backed) completion and a discussed Riverstart IV (~$250 million, 150 MW) are drawn from a 2025 Solar Power World article; the reported three-phase, 300-megawatt total figure and the Riverstart IV proposal should be treated as the state of the project as of that reporting rather than a confirmed current total, since this pass could not independently verify a single up-to-date master project summary. The separate Riverstart II denial (125 MW, proposed near Modoc, unanimously rejected by commissioners after a 90-plus-minute hearing, citing an agricultural-zoning conflict and concentration concerns) is drawn from Kicks 96 and Winchester News Gazette coverage; direct WebFetch to winchesternewsgazette.com was blocked by a network egress restriction throughout this research pass, so this page relies on WebSearch-indexed summaries of that reporting rather than full verbatim article reads, and the exact current date of the Riverstart II denial vote was not independently confirmed. The county's solar ordinance (Article XIX) has clearly been amended since 2020 (a March 2026-dated version was found posted), so specific 2020-era provisions described here may not reflect the ordinance's current text in full.

Verify directly with: the Randolph County Area Planning Commission for the solar ordinance's (Article XIX) current adopted terms and the status of any pending solar or wind project on or near a specific parcel, and the Randolph County Recorder for existing recorded solar-lease easements

Who to Call Before Buying Land in Randolph County

Direct WebFetch access to in.gov/counties/randolph and winchesternewsgazette.com was blocked or not attempted throughout this research pass, so several details reflect search-indexed content rather than a full verbatim read -- confirm current staff, fees, and the solar ordinance's exact current provisions directly.

Planning & Zoning