The Chesapeake Planning Commission recommended the City Council deny a rezoning request for a major data center project.
Citing a lack of information on key questions like water usage and noise, the commission voted 6-1 against the project.
The lone vote against denying approval was commissioner Michael Malone, who instead put a motion forward to delay the vote for 120 days to get answers to those questions.
"It wasn't that I didn't support the data center, or that I did. I didn't think we had enough information,” Malone told WHRO. "I wanted to be sure everyone was well informed."
The vote followed two-and-a-half hours of testimony from nearly 50 residents against the project. Even before that, the commission received 620 emails in opposition and a petition with 450 signatures advocating against the data center.
The commission’s denial came even though the project received a thumbs up from city staff.
Neighbors and other city residents speaking at the meeting cited concerns about noise, the drain on utilities, unanswered questions about tax breaks and a lack of notice and transparency while pushing the commission to reject the project.
Many emphasized the quality of life for neighbors of the proposed facility, who said they hadn’t signed up to live near an industrial building and the location was all wrong.
“I think this is a ‘right side of history’-type moment for Chesapeake, where you're just kind of etching your name in writing behind a decision that would invite a cancer into a thriving, quiet residential community,” said resident Steve Cowan, who’s home is less than a mile from the proposed site.
The proposal to develop the 350,00-square-foot center came from longtime Chesapeake developer Doug Fuller, who owns the property.
He said the site is perfect for a data center, with a high elevation to avoid flooding and existing connections to key utilities, including power. A next-generation fiber internet network to attract tech developments like Fuller’s is being installed and will run right past the property at Centerville Turnpike and Etheridge Manor Boulevard.
The city council will have final say on the rezoning request at a future meeting, and the body has already signaled interest in seeing the property developed.
At its April 15 meeting, the council unanimously voted to remove measures that have prevented the property from being rezoned, and thus developed, for decades.
City planning staff backed the move in part because it was “promoting the potential for a unique economic development opportunity and expanding the diversity of the city’s economic base.”
