US residents angry datacenters 'shoved down our throats' are recalling officials
People across the country are pushing for moratoriums, and electeds who approve projects are being punished
L enoxdatacenter.com went live in May, promoting what it called a “proposed advanced technology and data center campus” in Michigan. The site did not state who wanted to build the center. Lenox Township officials denied anyone had applied to build one.
Emails obtained by residents through an open records request showed, however, that developers had contacted the township supervisor and deputy supervisor asking for their support to build a datacenter.
The perceived secrecy surrounding the proposed datacenter prompted residents to pack public meetings that sometimes lasted more than four hours . They expressed outrage at officials in the Republican-led rural municipality 40 miles (64km) north of Detroit and submitted a petition seeking to recall four members of the Lenox board of trustees, which oversees township administration, zoning and municipal ordinances.
“The community still has questions that aren’t being answered and the public deserves to have transparency,” a resident said at a June board meeting after the trustees did not extend a four-month moratorium on datacenter development.
Like Lenox residents, people across the United States are increasingly pushing for moratoriums on new datacenters and trying to oust elected officials approving such projects.