Following action by the Emporia City Commission on Wednesday, the Flint Hills Digital Campus data center project is moving forward.
Project spokesman and strategist Garrett Nordstrom says one part of upcoming conversations will be the development agreement. He says those discussions will track with prior conversations on what the city has already mentioned as must-haves.
Nordstrom also expects community benefits should be included, including positions for local contractors and suppliers, workforce development partnerships and education items for Emporia State University and Flint Hills Technical College. Nordstrom also says unspecified financial protections should also be part of any development agreement.
The other main process, at least initially, is marketing to a possible end user. Nordstrom says potential end users have expressed interest in Emporia for months, including contacts after Wednesday’s meeting, and official marketing trips begin soon.
Nordstrom says the package of policies given to city commissioners on water and wastewater use and zoning, all approved unanimously, was a “landmark” point in the overall discussion.
Opponents have been sharply critical of the main concerns brought up whenever data centers are part of the conversation elsewhere across the country — noise, pollution, water use, energy use, lower final job numbers than originally presented. Locally, they have increasingly questioned the process behind the scenes, with allegations of payments and non-disclosure agreements becoming more prevalent. Nordstrom’s response to KVOE News echoed his response to city commissioners during Wednesday’s public discussion:
Nordstrom says “innovation and sustainability go hand in hand.”
Nordstrom continues to say the bankruptcy proceedings underway in federal court in Georgia against Gary Pinkston, the originally-announced developer, have no bearing on the current data center process in Emporia.
With one petition validated to stop high-impact data centers, another being reviewed on battery energy storage systems and two under development — one to change the city government structure and one to use special elections instead of appointments to fill vacant board positions — Nordstrom says the complexity of a possible development agreement means a document may not be ready for City Commission discussion for months.
