Legal maneuvering continues in connection to a potential data center in west Emporia.
Emporia Neighbors United is filing a complaint with the Kansas Attorney General’s Office on 2 fronts. First, the group says the city of Emporia is deliberately slow-walking its Kansas Open Records request for all information about the proposed Flint Hills Digital Campus, as well as related companies and people. The group has posted a letter from City Clerk Kerry Sull saying it could be late September before the city can fulfill that request due to unanticipated workload, staff availability and the magnitude of the request filed last month.
Second, founder Jay Vehige says the city “does not have a legal obligation or need to sue the citizens of our community to stop a petition.” That comment follows the city’s injunction filed officially against Vehige earlier this month. The city says the injunction wasn’t specifically against Vehige, but instead was designed to determine how to proceed with a petition seeking to ban high-impact data centers, especially with a potential vote on the ballot and no ruling yet on whether the petition is legislative or administrative in purpose. Senior Judge Glenn Braun says the petition has to go on the ballot and has not said when he plans to rule on the petition’s nature, so there is chance the petition could be approved by voters but be invalidated by a judicial ruling.
City commissioners have a special meeting at noon Wednesday to decide how to handle that petition and, perhaps, a related petition seeking to ban battery energy storage systems. Residents are encouraged to attend but there will not be a public comment period because of the special meeting status.
