Brown County Courthouse (Image: Courtesy of Brown County Clerk of Courts)
BROWN COUNTY, WI (WTAQ-WLUK) — Brown County is considering whether to implement a moratorium on data centers, but doing so wouldn’t necessarily stop data centers from being built around the county.
Planning, Development and Transportation Committee members are expected to discuss and vote on the data center moratorium Tuesday.
“We do want industry and everything like that, but we also want people to have control of their own destiny too,” said Brown County Supervisor Christopher Welch, who suggested the idea of the moratorium.
Moratoriums typically put a temporary pause on something while officials research it. However, in this case, a moratorium wouldn’t necessarily prevent the construction of a data center in Brown County.
“For us, as Brown County supervisors, this is allowing for us to possibly be another resource for municipalities to be able to make their determinations on what they want — whether that’s the guidance with the towns or their constituents,” Welch said.
He described the potential moratorium as “guidance” or a “framework” to follow if municipalities are approached about a data center. Welch said it would only provide support to communities.
Why? Because Brown County does not have county-wide zoning. This means officials can’t control land-use rules across the entire county, leaving those decisions up to individual municipalities.
“The idea here is to have local municipalities have a little bit more teeth with how they want to regulate,” Welch said.
Moratoriums at the county level are becoming more common in Wisconsin as data center proposals continue to pop up. Manitowoc County imposed one in late April, for example.
“The biggest concern that the Wisconsin Data Center Coalition has isn’t so much on a specific moratorium. It’s more so the larger amount of false information that’s sort of creating a lot of the fear and pushback in data centers,” Wisconsin Data Center Coalition Executive Director Tricia Braun said.
She said data centers use a closed loop water system, which she said doesn’t impact the local water supply. Braun also said utility rates wouldn’t be impacted.
She said she understands moratoriums give communities more time to process information, but hopes they don’t deter from future data center proposals.
“I think just saying ‘no’ to projects because of fear or broad general sentiment without understanding the facts — that’s missing an opportunity,” Braun said.
If the moratorium is passed by the Brown County committee, it will then head to the full County Board for a vote.
On Wednesday night, the Village of Wrightstown voted to put a referendum on data centers on the August ballot.
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