Set the terms before the data center

The data-center debate keeps getting reduced to a choice: welcome the investment or protect the community.

I don’t think that is enough.

Before a council votes, residents should know what the project requires, who pays for it and which promises can actually be enforced. That applies whether the eventual answer is yes or no.

Two June decisions show why.

Coachella did more than pause

On June 4, Coachella’s council unanimously approved a 45-day moratorium on data centers. It also terminated its development agreement with Stronghold Power Systems, the company behind the proposed Coachella Valley Technology Campus.

Both actions matter.

My earlier account treated the pause mainly as time to negotiate. That left out the termination of the agreement and understated what the council had done.

Residents had spent months challenging the project. The council was moving toward a permanent ban, according to KESQ’s reporting.

Stronghold, for its part, said the project would provide substantial benefits and environmental protections. It expressed disappointment at the termination and said it would review its options.

A moratorium does not tell us what the permanent rules will be. But ending a development agreement is more than holding a place in the calendar.

Imperial County’s decisions were different

On June 16, Imperial County supervisors unanimously approved a 45-day moratorium covering pending and future data-center projects, inewsource reported.

In April, the board had voted 4–1 to approve a land merger for developer Sebastian Rucci’s nearly one-million-square-foot project.

Those were different decisions. Calling the moratorium a reversal of the earlier approval collapses them into one.

There was also a dispute over what had already been approved. Rucci argued that the county could not retroactively stop an approved project. County counsel said no pending application had vested rights and, in his assessment, no data-center project had been approved.

That distinction is exactly why residents need the documents, not just the announcement.

What has been authorized? What remains undecided? What can the county still require?

The water promise changed

Rucci had said the project would rely on recycled wastewater rather than Colorado River water.

But negotiations with nearby cities broke down. By June, his company, Imperial Valley Computer Manufacturing, was suing the Imperial Irrigation District over access to river water.

KPBS reported that the request was for 260 million gallons annually. That averages about 712,000 gallons a day.

The company described turning to the district as a last resort after trying to secure recycled water. KPBS reported that the district had rejected its application in May.

A lawsuit seeking water is not an agreement supplying it. Nor does a proposed recycled-water plan establish that the necessary contracts and infrastructure are in place.

That is the part I want communities to examine before approval. What happens if the first plan fails? Does the project change, does another water source get sought, or does the public inherit a problem it thought had been settled?

My interest in this argument

Before I point to our own work, a disclosure.

I founded AI Coachella Valley and own SunshineFM LLC. The report I discuss here was published on aicoachellavalley.com, a product of SunshineFM LLC. AICV News is on the nonprofit side.

I’m making an argument supported in part by work I helped produce. Readers should know that before weighing it.

In April 2026, AI Coachella Valley published The Server Farm Next Door, Civic Intelligence Report No. 001.

Its useful premise is that hosting AI infrastructure and participating in the AI economy are different things. We can develop businesses, skills and institutions without assuming that hosting a server farm is the price of admission.

And if we do consider hosting one, the commitments should be specific.

Put the obligations in writing

Here is what I want a community to know before the vote.

What noise limits apply, where will sound be measured, and what happens when a limit is exceeded?

What is the water source? Is supply secured? Who pays if the cooling design or supply plan changes?

What electricity infrastructure must be built, and how are existing customers protected from its costs?

How many continuing local jobs are promised, at what wages, and how will anyone check?

What benefits reach the affected neighborhoods? Are they enforceable commitments or things the developer hopes to provide?

These are my tests for a proposal. They are not claims that either June decision imposed those terms.

A promise to be a good neighbor is not a noise standard. A job estimate is not a hiring commitment. A proposed water source is not a signed supply agreement.

A pause needs an outcome

I still believe a moratorium is worth what it produces before it lifts.

That could be a permanent prohibition. It could be enforceable operating standards. It could be a decision that a particular location or project does not work.

What it should not be is time passing while the same unanswered questions wait for the next meeting.

I would want noise limits with monitoring and enforcement. Water commitments with caps and clear cost responsibilities. Grid requirements tied to the project’s load. A workforce agreement with numbers someone checks. Community benefits secured before construction.

Those are requirements I’m arguing for, not provisions I have established in either city’s rules.

This remains an argument about the choices facing communities in June 2026. It is not an account of the projects’ or litigation’s current status.

Update, October 15: Corrected the developer name, June decisions and water arithmetic; revised the body, FAQ and metadata; removed claims not substantiated in this check; and added the author’s disclosure. Sat approved the corrected version. This is not a new report on current project or litigation status.

The valley does not owe a developer a yes. It owes its residents a decision they can understand.

Before the next vote, can we show them the terms—and say who will enforce them?