DeKalb extends data center moratorium 6 months

Credit: Miguel Martinez-Jimenez

Credit: Miguel Martinez-Jimenez

“If we approve the text amendments in January, there really wouldn’t be a rationale for having (the moratorium) in place another five months,” Commissioner Ted Terry said after the meeting.

A draft of the legislation generally requires data centers be built at least 500 feet from homes, county parks or trails and a half-mile from high-capacity public transit stops. Some residents say 500 feet is not nearly far enough from homes and that no data centers should be built in the county, period.

The Board of Commissioners approved a temporary moratorium on any new data centers or expansions in July — then extended it in October — while county officials work on regulations.

The moratorium had been set to expire Tuesday, but the board voted unanimously to extend it another six months. Tuesday’s action came after the board rejected Terry’s motion that the county extend the moratorium for 12 months, allowing time for a study on the health and environmental impacts of data centers.

Terry’s proposal for the yearlong extension was rejected by a 4-3 vote with LaDena Bolton, Mereda Davis Johnson, Chakira Johnson and Robert Patrick opposing.

After Terry’s proposal was voted down, Bolton made the motion for the six-month extension, calling it a “great compromise.”

“I do not support campus-sized data centers in residential communities, but I do support regulating data centers so that we get the greatest benefit with the lowest risk,” said Bolton, who represents Super District 7.

Terry said the vote for the six-month extension did not include funding for an impact study and that he will continue pushing for one.

Some residents are particularly worried about a 1-million-square-foot data center “campus” proposed in southwest DeKalb at the Clayton County line in the Ellenwood area. The property is in Commissioner Nicole Massiah’s District 3 and Terry’s Super District 6.

A vote on that project is scheduled for January.

Massiah said Tuesday she has heard her constituents’ concerns, including about potential emissions and the impact of the project on water resources. She said she supported an extension of the moratorium so more research could be done.

“I want to protect people,” she said. “Everything else is secondary.”

Credit: Miguel Martinez-Jimenez

Credit: Miguel Martinez-Jimenez

Quanda Stroud, one of more than a dozen residents who raised concerns about data centers during public comment, said afterward she was glad the moratorium was extended.

“It’s important that the commissioners are at least willing to hear the residents of DeKalb County,” said Stroud, who has lived in south DeKalb for more than 20 years and held a community forum on data centers in November. “I think it’s really clear that the residents of DeKalb County do not want a large-scale or hyper-scale data center anywhere in unincorporated DeKalb County.”

Some residents chastised commissioners for even considering regulation of large data centers, instead of banning them outright.

Lifelong DeKalb resident Rafi Powell, of Lithonia, questioned whether commissioners had residents’ best interests in mind.

“We know we won’t get justice here,” Powell said. “If y’all are really on our side, vote no. Simple. Vote against the Ellenwood site and future data centers in our communities.”

Dr. Jewel Crawford, a public health physician, told commissioners that a lot of well-informed residents are asking for an extension on the moratorium.

“It is my professional opinion that it is unconscionable to consider permitting huge data centers before even doing an in-depth public health impact study and an in-depth environmental impact study,” Crawford said. “Where is the research?”

She added that members of the community worked hard to get some of the commissioners elected and they hope those politicians will represent their interests.

“Don’t betray us,” she said.