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As a subscriber you can listen to articles at work, in the car, or while you work out. Subscribe NowWe were disappointed to see an Indianapolis City-County Council committee move forward this week with a moratorium on new data center construction through the end of 2027, a proposal that still needs approval from the full council. We urge members to vote no.
We understand that councilors have heard from many constituents urging them to pause consideration of data center proposals, which admittedly are coming so quickly that it’s hard to keep track of them all.
But a moratorium — particularly a pause through the end of 2027 — is short-sighted, puts a closed-for-business sign on Indianapolis and would rip flexibility away from city officials just when opportunity is knocking.
Artificial intelligence and the data centers necessary to make it possible are not going away. Taking a stand against data center development won’t change that. It could, of course, push that data center development elsewhere, however, along with the jobs and investment that would come with it.
We are not naive. We know there are plenty of problems that can come from a data center development — just as there are with other large-scale developments. Noise, power and water use, aesthetics and the fear that the thing could close up shop one day and leave a huge empty building in a neighborhood. These concerns are legitimate.
But rather than simply pause consideration of data center proposals, we would urge city officials to be proactive now in determining where to site the developments and how to take advantage of the companies’ eagerness to act. This is the moment to steer data center proposals to brownfield areas in Indianapolis that desperately need cleaning up and to require tech companies to invest in infrastructure the city can’t afford to pay for.
City officials are not required to say yes to any particular development. And this is one of those rare situations when companies are so eager to build that they might be willing to agree to terms that other developers might scoff at.
Mayor Joe Hogsett supports the moratorium and said in a statement that he welcomes the additional time to continue “this vital conversation.”
We don’t think that’s necessary. Of course, the Department of Metropolitan Development, the City-County Council and other city agencies should do their due diligence when it comes to reviewing proposals for new data centers. But we have the confidence they’re fully capable of doing so now, without an 18-month pause to do more thinking and strategizing.
Indianapolis is just the latest community to consider a temporary moratorium. We have concerns about many of those actions as well, even as we empathize with rural local governments with tiny regulatory staffs and less experience with development. We think the pause in Indianapolis, though, is of particular concern because the city could use the investment.
Rather than taking a pause, we’d like to see the Hogsett administration jump into the driver’s seat and see if Indianapolis can use this data center push to the city’s advantage. It might not work. If it doesn’t, then just say no. But don’t take the city out of the race.•
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