As people become aware of what these AI data centers are and their impacts upon communities, including utilities and water, more people are standing up and saying “No” to them being built in their cities and counties. The latest city is Chandler, Arizona.
Politico reports:
CHANDLER, Arizona — Officials in a Phoenix suburb on Thursday rejected a proposed artificial intelligence data center despite pressure from a former U.S. senator and a tech industry lobbying group — capping a fight over local control that has captured national attention.
The Chandler City Council voted unanimously against a request by a New York developer to rezone a plot of land to build a data center and business complex. The vote caps a local battle that escalated after the intervention of former U.S. Sen. Kyrsten Sinema (I-Ariz.) and raised new questions about tech industry efforts to influence local decisions around data center projects.
Explaining her no vote, Chandler Vice Mayor Christine Ellis said that she had long framed her decision about the local benefits rather than the national push to build AI. She recalled a meeting with Sinema where she asked point-blank, “what’s in it for Chandler?”
“If you can’t show me what’s in it for Chandler, then we are not having a conversation,” Ellis said before voting against the project.
Even as the Trump administration pushes the construction of data centers and new energy infrastructure to power them, local governments are increasingly pushing back. Several other Arizona cities, including Phoenix and Tucson, have written zoning rules for data centers or placed new requirements on the facilities. Local officials in cities in Oregon, Missouri, Virginia, Arizona and Indiana have also rejected planned data centers.
On Thursday, President Donald Trump also signed an executive order that would preempt state laws regulating AI models. However, that order is not intended to override regulations related to data centers and physical infrastructure. The order proposes the development of a legislative framework to codify preemption but states it would not affect state laws related to “AI compute and data center infrastructure, other than generally applicable permitting reforms.”
The Environmental Protection Agency this week also created a team to help data centers move through federal permitting.
The vote in Chandler, however, shows that a significant amount of AI infrastructure still runs through local governments.
“This is not just Chandler. We’re dealing with this all over,” Eric Runnestrand, a Chandler resident opposed to the project, said in an interview. “Having the community show up, it sends a message to the elected officials. They need to feel the people power behind them.”
The local fight gained outsized attention after Sinema offered public comment at two local meetings in Chandler on behalf of the AI Infrastructure Coalition. The former senator said she was working “hand in glove with the Trump administration.”
The AI Infrastructure Coalition is backed by the lobbying firm Hogan Lovells and tech and energy giants including Andreessen Horowitz, Microsoft, Meta, ExxonMobil, NextEra and Pinnacle West, which owns Arizona’s largest utility. It’s aimed at advocating for all aspects of AI, including energy, manufacturing and financing.
The moral of the story: David vs Goliath is very much for today as the people take on these big tech giants and defeat them with a single voice. Well done, Chandler!
