PERU — Jason McClure, an apple farmer in Miami County, said he didn’t have any plans to run for political office this year.
But that changed when the Miami County Plan Commission voted in May to give a favorable recommendation to a data center ordinance and lift a temporary moratorium on the projects. Hundreds of residents attended the meeting to speak out against it.
That included McClure, who wants to reinstate the moratorium. The day after the meeting, he went to the courthouse to file as an independent to challenge two-term Republican County Commissioner Fred Musselman, who serves on the board and voted to pass the ordinance.
“It was the straw that broke my back to get into the race,” McClure said. “Enough is enough. My neighbors are showing up and they’re not being heard.”
‘This election’s boogeyman’
As proposals to build hyperscale data centers rapidly ramp up across Indiana, the controversial developments have become the defining issue in many local races where elected officials are considering the issue.
Voters are asking whether candidates for county commissioner and council seats support or oppose data centers. For some, the answer will determine their vote, according to Chad Kinsella, director of Ball State University’s Bowen Center for Public Affairs.
“Data centers have kind of become this election cycle’s boogeyman,” he said. “It seems to be that everybody hates them and is terrified that one’s going to show up in their vicinity.”
At the beginning of the year, Indiana had 38 operational data centers and 37 more under construction or planned for development, according to the University of Virginia’s Weldon Cooper Center for Public Service. A number of large-scale projects have been proposed or approved since then, including in Kokomo, Hobart, Wheatfield, Frankfort and Sullivan County.
Nearly 70% of likely voters in Indiana say they oppose construction of new data centers, according to a Free Press Indiana Poll conducted by Bellwether Research. Just 18% said they supported more construction and 13% were unsure.
Shannon McFarland, who lives in Peru, which is located in Miami County, said she strongly opposes a data center anywhere in the county. She said that’s the only reason she’s voting for McClure, the independent candidate who wants a moratorium.
“Most of this town does not want them here,” McFarland said. “I will absolutely vote for McClure.”
In rural Jasper County, commissioners in June unanimously approved a development agreement with Amazon to build a $7 billion, 304-acre data center campus near Wheatfield.
Resident Shawna Reid said she strongly opposes the project and wishes she could vote against Rein Bontreger, the incumbent Republican commissioner on the ballot, but he’s running unopposed.
With no option to vote for an alternate candidate, Reid is pushing her state legislators to draft a law to allow Hoosiers to vote out commissioners for “serious misconduct” before their term is up.
“If you don’t have a say in pulling them out of there if they have committed some travesty while they’re in office, that’s not cool,” Reid said.
Guardrails or bans? Voters will decide
But some county commissioners running for office are banking on voters who are more open to data center developments showing up at the polls.
Angela Henzman, the Democratic candidate for LaPorte County commissioner, said she has concerns about data centers, but thinks an outright ban or moratorium isn’t the answer.
The issue is top of mind for residents there. Amazon is building a $1 billion data center campus in the city of La Porte, and Google has plans to build a 70-acre project in Michigan City.
Henzman said she’s pushing for any new projects to be built in an industrial park in the county under tight restrictions aimed at protecting residents and the environment.
“There’s a small group of people who will say, ‘I’m 100% against that,’” Henzman said. “But then there are so many people along the spectrum that are saying, ‘I understand they’re here. I just don’t want them on farmland, or near my kids’ schools or near my home.’”
Jody Slabaugh, the Republican running for the LaPorte County commissioner seat, said he thinks most voters are against any more data centers coming. He’s proposing a moratorium on new developments — something 32 other counties around Indiana have adopted.
“There’s definitely some that are going to say, ‘No, I don’t want a data center, and I’m not voting for anybody who says they’re going to put one here,’” Slabaugh said.
A poll released this month commissioned by the American Infrastructure Alliance found a majority of Americans prefer stricter data center guardrails over moratoriums.
Nearly 55% of voters said they favor allowing data center construction if the company pays for its own electricity needs to protect ratepayers and guarantees it will protect environmental resources. Less than a third (31%) of those polled called for outright bans.
Musselman, the Republican incumbent in Miami County facing off against independent McClure, said he doesn’t regret passing the controversial data center ordinance there. He said it creates reasonable guardrails to protect residents while still reaping projects’ economic benefits, like new jobs and increased tax revenue.
Musselman said they’ll find out soon whether more residents support his approach over a straightforward moratorium on the developments.
“I guess that’s what Nov. 3 is going to tell,” he said. “If I lose, I was wrong in how I read the community. If I win, I must have been right. I don’t know how else to say it.”
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FPI News reporter Carson Gerber covers healthcare, manufacturing, agriculture, immigration … and just about any other topic that’s shaping how we live in Indiana today. Reach him at 765-204-4250 or carson.gerber@fpinews.org.
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