Township Supervisor Decides She is Against the Data Center After Public Pressure + Campaign Updates
Supervisor Brenda Stumbo has changed her tune DRAMATICALLY and is not only now against the data center, but has a series of actions she is taking to stop the data center!! I'll let you read the email, because she lays it out!
"thank you for your informative email, I will read the articles, have been in court and arbitration hearing this entire week and they still continue the rest of the week. I could not agree with you more and have learned that the Department of Energy has not approved the site in question and our State Representatives encouraged us all to write letters to them as well as our Congress representatives to have them help stop the approval of this site. One of our Trustees has a draft already for us to review, and our goal is to get it out no later than Monday.
I have also contacted Congresswomen Debbie Dingell who has informed me that there is currently legislation that was passed by the house (which she objected to) and in the Senate which removes the State, County and Local approvals for Data Centers or any AI related developments in the United States. This makes me sick to my stomach to even type this and I have asked Congresswomen Dingell for the language, she is trying to help protect the location of this Data Center and disapproves of the University of Michigan taking over the fragile land, and not paying their fair share of taxes, creating jobs that are remote etc. I will not speak for her and will copy her and her staff on this email.
When U of M called for a zoom meeting the day before they made the announcement, they had purchased 26 acres of land across from the Ford Plant on Textile which is zoned to allow light manufacturing, and was committed to creating 200 jobs, with promise to have municipal benefits etc. I knew that they could and have done whatever they want in communities, with total disregard for their impact. I did not expect them to purchase an additional 100 acres next to the 26 acres. I knew there was nothing we could do in regard to its location since they were a school, zoning does not matter to U of M or any school, we really should look at changing the State law.
They are partnering with a private company that would pay taxes, and they do not have to go through the process because U of M bought the property, and they are located on their property. How much are they making on this private public partnership?
There are several other data centers looking to locate and we do need guardrails on sound, vibration, third party reviews since they are being located on environments that provide habitat to many wildlife which could be affected by the noise and vibration. They will need a state permit I'm guessing from EGLE, Water Resources, Road Commission, DTE, YCUA and Fire Marshal review and approval.
I do not trust U of M, they misled me and the Township in the first zoom call, for the 26 acres of flat land and then called the second time before announcing the second purchase of over 100 acres, we have no information on size of facility, last night I heard the big bad data center will be in our area and a smaller one will be located in Ann Arbor, do not know if it is true but it is all very disturbing and because we have water and sewer capacity in the YCUA system I'm guessing this is why they are coming to the east side of Washtenaw and western side of Wayne County.
Some of our residents do support having a data center, however I'm sure they do not have all the information that we have learned from our residents and personal research.
U of M Ann Arbor is harming our future and quality of life by a mega data center in which they do not have to be accountable for to anyone. Maybe the State can claw back the 100 million dollars they gave to them, which again was not shared with our community prior to voting for this. It sounded ok to have a smaller one in a light industrial zone, creating 200 jobs and being a partner with the community.
However, I have learned as Supervisor they are not to be trusted and do not do what is best for community, the people or the environment. They do what is best for them and their money grabbing purchase of land should scare the hell out of all elected officials in the State.
We will do our best to strategically prevent them from developing the 100 acres of land next to the Huron River. We can use our county and state reviews and have them guarantee the noise and vibration will not affect the aquatic life and habitat in the largest wooded land in the area. We all need to work on preventing the federal legislation that exempts AI facilities from State and local regulations. We need to contact the Department of Energy, and we need to keep pushing for representatives to represent the people and not U of M, the richest of all.
Thank you again for the email and information, and for your pride and knowledge of who we are as a community. We stand ready to fight this injustice and asking for assistance from our county, state and federal governments officials.
I do plan on visiting some data centers in Ohio, to learn more and to hear the sound and feel the vibrations. These are private entities and since we have not been told of size of facility it is unfair and hard to compare to another data center.
We are at a disadvantage, but taking this public may help shame the U of M into doing the right thing for the lowest opportunity area in the county, with their own study saying we need to increase the health, education and income of our area. This hurts our health, hurts our environment and doesn't provide jobs or opportunities for our communities.
Sincerely, Brenda Stumbo"
This is a wild 1800 from the defensive, apologist handout given out at the last township meeting. Truly, Brenda is trying to prove she is "not a fool", as citizens encouraged her last meeting. We need to leverage this change of heart to put pressure on the Dept of Energy, state and national legislators, and most of all the list of local officials that the township believes can stop the data center: EGLE, Water Resources, Road Commission, DTE, YCUA and Fire Marshal. Now that the township is on our side, we need to creatively leverage their power to stop the data center!
What do you want the board to do to stop the data center? Come tell them at the next meeting, Tuesday July 15th at 6pm at the Stumbo building.
Other Campaign Updates:
Stop the data center activists attended two official meetings this week, the Augusta Township Meeting, where the Augusta Data Center Plan was discussed (a DIFFERENT data center, ten minutes away from the Hydro Park Data Center), and the YCUA water board meeting.
The Augusta Township meeting was a FULL room, with many local residents who were fired up, feeling absolutely betrayed by the Augusta Township Board. The Augusta township board had the gall to taught the crowd, asking a public commenter if they needed “to get a crayon out” to explain to him why the data center was in line with Augusta's Master Plan. The board did vote unanimously to rezone the proposed site from agricultural use to industrial, inline with what the data center requires. However, this fight is far from over; there is no clear source of water on the location for the data center so serious hookups and approvals from the YCUA are required before anyone can think about building a data center on the site.
The YCUA meeting was eventful! Seven Stop the Data Center activists showed up to this midday Wednesday meeting. The board was blown away, saying they had never received public comment before. Despite there being 40 minutes left in the meeting, they moved to limit public comment to two minutes per person after the first commenter. However, the Executive Director of the YCUA, Luther Blackburn, did say they had not yet issued a permit for the Hydro Park Data Center or the Augusta Data Center, and it was part of the board's responsibility to decide whether or not to issues these permits. He said he welcomed folks to email him with questions or comments at director@ycua.org