College Township council updates zoning to address potential data centers

The College Township Council approved updates to its zoning ordinance Thursday that serve as preparatory measures for potential future AI data centers, making it the first municipality in the Centre Region to do so.

While no data centers have been proposed for the area yet, the unanimous vote from the council means that the definition of a “data center” and its inclusion as a conditional use within the township’s rural residential zoning district has been added to the township’s zoning ordinance.

According to the council’s meeting agenda, the official definition of a data center is, “buildings or premises primarily occupied by computers and/or telecommunications equipment where data is processed, transferred and/or stored.”

College Township Assistant Manager Mike Bloom said Thursday that the updates were in response to state Senate Bill 939, which is currently working its way through the legislature. If passed, it would “hamstring” local municipalities’ abilities to review, provide comment on and add requirements to AI data center development plan submissions, Bloom said.

Specifically, the bill would cut data center development plan review periods from 90 days to 30 days in areas where they’re considered a permitted use, which, before Thursday, included College Township’s rural residential zoning district.

Additionally under the bill, townships would not be permitted to add any extra conditions onto data center development plans other than what would typically apply to a traditional industrial use.

By including the data centers as a conditional use, Bloom said Tuesday, any data center development plans would receive a 120-day review period, and more conditions could be added to those plans, under the bill.

“Recognizing the potential impacts of data centers to our community, we want to have as much time available and the ability to apply conditions where we’re able to do so, to make sure that we minimize any impacts that would ultimately be associated with any proposed data centers at this point,” Bloom said Thursday.

Some of those impacts, according to a study from the Michigan University Gerald R. Ford School of Public Policy, include massive amounts of energy consumption and water usage, ineffective tax incentives, greater climate and energy challenges and more.

At a Feb. 5 Centre Region Planning Commission meeting, Patton Township Planning Commission member William Burnett cited some of those impacts and called the ordinance updates “a very bad idea.”

College Township Principal Planner Lindsay Schoch said that zoning updates were solely preparatory and served to keep the township’s zoning ordinance as up-to-date as possible with state law, and would strategically limit any data center plan submissions to an area near the Oak Hall Quarry.

On Thursday, College Township Council member Eric Bernier said that Burnett “completely misunderstood” what the township was trying to do.

“He was opposing this, when in reality, one would think they would support this if you want that ability to place conditions on what people are calling issues,” Bernier said. “Without this action, we’ve got nothing.”

Bernier also praised his township staff’s forward-minded thinking, as College Township is the first Centre Region municipality to implement zoning changes related to data centers, which are booming across Pennsylvania and the U.S.

Other municipalities may follow College Township’s lead. Ferguson Township Planning Commission member Bill Keough, who, in conjunction with fellow commission member Lewis Steinberg, recommended at their Feb. 9 meeting that their township’s staff begin working on the zoning amendments “immediately.”

“We do feel that that’s something that was brought up at the regional level because of College Township,” Keough said during a Ferguson Township supervisors meeting Tuesday. “None of us in the region currently have data centers listed in our land use ordinances, and there seems to be a priority there.”