‘Political theater’: Delaware lawmakers end deadlock over controversial offshore wind bill
Senate Republicans, upset over an offshore wind bill, had threatened to deny support for a budget bill.
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Delaware Gov. Matt Meyer signs fiscal year 2026 budget legislation in the early hours of July 1, 2025. (Sarah Mueller/WHYY)
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Delaware lawmakers ended this year’s legislative session with Gov. Matt Meyer’s signature on all the budget bills after hours of uncertainty over whether they would leave Legislative Hall without passing a $977 million capital infrastructure bill.
Senate Republicans held up the passage due to their opposition to a controversial offshore wind bill.
There’s been no lack of drama this session, with Senate Democrats battling Gov. Matt Meyer’s administration over nominees for the Port of Wilmington, Democrats in the House fracturing over the session-long absence of former state Rep. Stell Parker Selby, Republicans fighting Democrats over local control of land use decisions for marijuana retail stores and a substation for an offshore wind project.
Hostage taking
The General Assembly passed the 2026 fiscal year $6.58 billion budget and the $37 million one-time supplemental spending bill last week, which Meyer signed into law early Tuesday morning. But enough Senate Republicans withheld their approval to sink the capital budget, also known as the bond bill, during Thursday’s vote in an attempt to hold it hostage to try to get a deal on a measure that would override Sussex County’s denial of a permit for an offshore wind project.
US Wind, a Baltimore-based subsidiary of an Italian energy company, has planned two projects off the Delmarva Peninsula that would provide Maryland with renewable power. The first, dubbed MarWin, would construct 21 turbines to generate 300 megawatts of electricity — enough to power 92,000 homes.
Sussex County Council voted 4-1 late last year to reject a permit application for US Wind subsidiary Renewable Development’s substation at the Indian River Power Plant, a former coal-burning station, in Dagsboro. The subsidiary has appealed the decision to the Delaware Superior Court.
The company plans to run power transmission cables from its proposed wind farm, located 3 miles offshore in the Atlantic Ocean to 3Rs Beach at Delaware Seashore State Park. The cables would run beneath Delaware-regulated wetlands, state waters and the Indian River Bay, and connect to the proposed substation.
The Senate passed the bill overturning that decision, sponsored by state Sen. Stephanie Hansen, D-Middletown, earlier this month and along party lines. The House passed it Monday night and Meyer quickly signed it into law.
The new law requires the permitting of an electric substation as a conditional use in a heavy industrial zone, including for a proposed renewable energy generation project of at least 250 megawatts. It is retroactive, meaning that if a county previously denied a permit that met these conditions on or after Aug. 3, 2023, the permit would automatically be approved.
Hours of uncertainty
Whether and when the final budget bill, the bond bill, would pass remained in doubt for much of the day and night. The appropriations bill requires a three-quarters vote, so it’s one of the bills Republicans, who are in the minority, can use to try to get their priorities accomplished by withholding their votes.
Senate Minority Whip Brian Pettyjohn, R-Georgetown, said during the debate on the measure that the legislature should wait for the courts to decide the issue.
“I believe that we have to give them time to weigh in on this,” he said. “So that we know whether or not we’re actually doing the right thing or not by telling one of our local governments that, ‘We don’t trust you to make the right decision, we’re going to take this decision away from you.’”
Senate Democrats had argued that the state could not afford to wait for the court process to play out.
“Six months can be a huge difference maker with regard to getting things right,” Senate Majority Leader Bryan Townsend said. “We don’t want to sit and wait six months into next year, although we did offer that up ultimately and agreed to it and it wasn’t sufficient.”
Compromise
Intended to address Democrats’ belief that Republicans opposed the bill because it would cause a “slippery slope” of state overruling county decisions, House bill sponsor Claire Snyder-Hall, D-Rehoboth Beach, introduced an amendment to the bill in the early evening that would sunset the legislation as of Jan. 1, 2027. But House Republicans still voted against the bill, as did Senate Republicans when it returned to the Senate for approval of the House revision.
So the parties went back to the drawing board for a solution. A second bill was passed by the General Assembly and signed by Meyer that delays the date Sussex County must issue the substation permit until Jan. 31. It also repeals the sunset clause in the failed House bargain.
The Senate and House passed the deal without opposition and then signed off on the infrastructure legislation.
Pettyjohn said the agreement allows the courts to weigh in on the matter without interference from the legislature, preserving local control.
“This gives it enough time for Superior Court to hear the case and for a decision to come down,” he said. “I will say that talking to [Sussex County’s] county administrator, he did support the path that we’re taking forward now.”
Townsend said while Democrats would have preferred to see the offshore wind construction move quicker, setting the Jan. 31 effective date provides certainty to the project and allowed the bond bill to move forward.
“There was a lot of political theater around all this, when, again, we’re just focused on lower energy prices for Delawareans, more reliable electricity for Delawareans, green energy,” he said. “I wish everyone was focused on that, but there was some element of political theater from the opponents tonight.”
Meyer also signed his first budget Monday. The $6.58 billion spending plan is a more than 7% increase over last year’s budget. He also signed off on a $98.2 million Grants-in-Aid bill that directs money to nonprofit organizations.
The budget includes a 2% raise for state employees, $8 million for a literacy emergency fund, $85 million for the state’s Medicaid program and $2 million for additional rental housing vouchers.
Editor’s note: WHYY receives funding from the state of Delaware through the Grants-in-Aid bill.
This story was supported by a statehouse coverage grant from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.

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