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I’ve filed a Right to Know request with Springfield township for this. I’ll publish whatever comes back, including the denials.
All correspondence, including emails, letters, text messages, and memoranda, between any Springfield Township elected official, employee, manager, solicitor, engineer, zoning officer, or code enforcement officer and any data center developer, data center operator, hyperscale computing company, site selection consultant, commercial real estate broker, or any attorney or agent acting on behalf of such an entity, from January 1, 2025 to the present.
Records of any pre-application meeting, conference, site visit, or informal consultation held with any party regarding the potential development, siting, or zoning of a data center, computing facility, or similar high-density electrical load facility within Springfield Township, from January 1, 2025 to the present, including any calendar entries, meeting notes, sign-in sheets, or agendas.
All inquiries received by the Township, in any form, regarding the zoning classification, permitted uses, utility capacity, or development potential of any specific parcel in Springfield Township where the inquiry referenced a data center, computing facility, server farm, or similar use, from January 1, 2025 to the present.
All correspondence between any Springfield Township official, employee, or professional consultant and PECO Energy, PJM Interconnection, Aqua Pennsylvania, or any other utility or transmission operator concerning large-load interconnection, transmission capacity, substation capacity, or water or sewer capacity for a commercial or industrial user, from January 1, 2025 to the present.
Any existing draft, outline, working document, or model ordinance relating to data center zoning that is in the possession of the Township or its solicitor, together with all correspondence transmitting or discussing such documents.
All invoices, billing statements, and time entries submitted to Springfield Township by its solicitor or any outside counsel that reference data centers, data center zoning, or related zoning research, from January 1, 2025 to the present.
Springfield Township commissioners voted unanimously to have Solicitor Byrne research and draft a data center ordinance.
They were honest that under Pennsylvania law you have to make a place for every legitimate use.
The chair pointed at townships in Chester County and Montgomery County already sitting on data center applications. He said that they will be pulling ordinances from other municipalities and going to seminars on what you can and can’t do.
He publicly said the process from here is…develop draft, then goes to Springfield’s planning commission, then the Delaware County Planning Commission, then a public hearing, then a board vote.
It’s the Springfield Board of Commissioners…they have a history of being untrustworthy. Closed door meetings, violating sunshine laws, etc.
I spoke to Jim McLaughlin (Springfield resident), and he told me that they have burned the public’s trust in how they handled the hospital, the new Wawa on Baltimore Pike, and the new micro hospital on State Road. Other residents had concerns that we dont have any transparency as to where the EIT funds are going to.
Jim also said that there are no deliberations taking place in open meetings that he’s attended, and that there are concerns amongst residents that there may be deliberations taking place outside of open meetings or in “executive session.”
McLaughlin has served on the Delaware County Solid Waste Authority, as vice president of a school board and was most recently Democratic candidate for Springfield Board of Commissioners in the last election.
Commissioners did say four separate times that there are no applications are pending.
But…“no application has been filed” and “nobody has contacted us” are two completely different statements, and seems like something this board would slither around.
We shall see…I asked for the emails. Correspondence with any data center developer, operator, or site selection consultant going back to Jan 2025. Pre application meetings…any inquiry about a specific parcel etc.
Springfields earned income tax collection started July 1. Residents have been vocal with the board about transparency…wanting to know where the money goes and how much is coming in.
There was a public comment asking whether there’d been any movement on the matter and the only answer given was delivered on behalf of the Commissioner who wasn’t there…that he’s been working on it with township IT and that website pages are.
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Karen asked whether residents could petition to keep them out entirely.
You can’t. The PA Supreme Court has said repeatedly you can’t exclude a legitimate use, so you cant prohibit it, but you can make it as difficult as possible to go anywhere residents wouldn’t want it.
The best tool a Pennsylvania twp has against a use its residents don’t want is basically just obstruction. Zoning language written carefully enough to be annoying to the point where its not worth it for the developer.
Harrisburg wrote a system where municipalities are required to find somewhere for every profitable use.
This agenda is laughable…
The agenda lists “data center ordinance” with no detail about what it was, plus something called an MMO…
One lady said to put more information in the agenda, so people who care show up instead of finding out afterward…
Great idea. Will they do that?
By the way, MMO is the minimum municipal obligation, the pension contribution the township is required to make.
Watch out for the draft. It goes to Springfield’s planning commission and the county planning commission before it hits a public hearing, and by then the language is mostly set.
Ask Springfields board now, in writing, for…water and power usage caps written into the ordinance, a noise standard measured at the property line. And a requirement that any applicant fund an independent utility impact study.
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