Many people around the Fredericksburg area attend public hearings to speak out against data centers, worried about the businesses’ potential effects.
But not AnnMarie Halterman.
She came to Wednesday night’s Stafford County Planning Commission meeting to praise a proposed data center, a facility that houses computer systems used for data storage and processing.
Halterman serves as the trustee for property near the planned Cranes Corner Data Center on U.S. 1, north of the intersection with Centreport Parkway. Her family bought the land to build a house there, and she said she thought the appearance of the data center and the noise it would generate would end up being better than another industrial use. She was also pleased with another matter: security.
Halterman said that when she looks “at built assets and neighborly situations, I look at this data center from my perspective, my background, and I think in my mind, it’s safer for my neighborhood, where my family would be, because of the extra security that’s happening.”
After her comments, Clark Leming, an attorney for the Cranes Corner developer, asked rhetorically: “Do we agree completely with the last speaker?”
The commissioners may have. They voted unanimously to recommend that the Board of Supervisors approve a rezoning from agricultural and light industrial to heavy industrial for the data center project. It would be on about 46 acres and allow for the development of up to 900,000 square feet of data center buildings.
It also would use air-cooled systems, closed-loop systems or other low-impact, non-public-water-based cooling systems; water use is often a concern with data centers that instead cool their facilities with water.
Garrisonville District Commissioner Laura Sellers noted Halterman’s comments when saying she would support the data center application.
“Unlike some of the other applications that may be coming before us, the impacts to local residents are minimal,” she said. “And, with one resident coming forward and saying that she does support it, you know, that does kind of sway things.”
Also, said Rock Hill District Commissioner Kristen Barnes: “No project’s perfect, but if I was going to pick a place to put a data center, this is probably one of the ones that I would choose.”
During a break in Wednesday’s meeting, Halterman expounded on her data center comments, saying it’s easy to drive up and down U.S. 1 and see other businesses that are an eyesore or that create lots of noise.
“But what’s being proposed here has been really well-thought-out as far as how to protect visibility of the facility because it behooves them to have that, as well,” she said. “And so they don’t want their data center to stick out. They would rather have people drive by and really not even know that it’s there.”
Also on Wednesday, commissioners voted unanimously to recommend new regulations for tobacco/vape shops.
The rules stipulate that tobacco/vape shops be allowed only on certain land zoned for commercial use, and that they not be located within 1,000 feet of a childcare center or a public, private or parochial school.
The regulations would not affect shops already operating or any store that sells tobacco and vape products in addition to their primary goods. There are about 25 tobacco and vape shops in Stafford, mostly concentrated along the State Route 610 and U.S. 17 corridors. About six of the existing shops are located near child care centers and/or schools.
