Voters in the small Mississippi River city of Festus, Missouri, ousted four incumbent city council members in a sweeping election rebuke last week, signaling mounting grassroots resistance to large-scale data center developments nationwide, Politico reported.
The election, held Tuesday in the city of 12,000 residents located 35 miles south of St. Louis, followed the council's recent approval of a controversial $6 billion data center project.
Data centers are large industrial facilities that house computer servers used to store and process data for cloud computing, artificial intelligence, and online services.
The projects typically require vast amounts of electricity and water to operate and are often backed by major technology companies seeking to expand digital infrastructure.
All four incumbents who backed the development were defeated amid a surge in voter turnout.
"It's really the way the deal was handled that led to this kind of uprising," said Rick Belleville, a first-time candidate who defeated incumbent Jim Tinnin by more than 40 percentage points in the Ward 4 race.
The other incumbents who lost their reelection bids were Jim Collier, Brian Wehner, and Bobby Venz.
Belleville said his campaign focused heavily on concerns that city officials failed to adequately inform or listen to residents about the project, which is planned for 360 wooded acres on the city's southwest side.
"I ran because I thought the city was not listening to people," he said.
The backlash in Festus reflects a national trend, as communities push back against hyperscale data centers tied to growing demand from major technology firms.
On the same day as the Missouri vote, residents in the Milwaukee suburb of Port Washington, Wisconsin, approved a first-of-its-kind referendum restricting future data center developments. The measure comes as companies, including Oracle and OpenAI, plan a $15 billion data center campus in the area.
Similar measures are expected to appear on ballots in at least three other U.S. cities this year.
In Festus, opposition to the project has continued to intensify following the election.
Residents have launched a recall effort targeting Mayor Sam Richards and the remaining council members, while also filing a lawsuit in St. Louis County Circuit Court challenging the rezoning of the site and the city's development agreement with CRG, a subsidiary of Chicago-based Clayco.
The lawsuit alleges a lack of transparency and accuses city officials of conducting discussions outside of public view in an effort to limit opposition.
Residents living near the proposed site say they were left in the dark for months as negotiations advanced.
Lori Merriman, a nearby homeowner who helped organize a grassroots opposition group, said she didn't learn about the project until months after discussions had begun. Her group, Wake Up JeffCo, has since mobilized residents across the region.
"This is going in almost next door to our house," Merriman said.
"We just built it two years ago. It was supposed to be our forever home."
Documents obtained through public records requests and cited in the lawsuit also reveal internal communications among city officials that critics say show dismissiveness toward residents.
In one exchange, officials discussed avoiding "getting caught in the sideshow of uneducated people," while another message referenced a "need to keep the flock herded."
The records further indicate involvement from higher levels of state government.
Messages cited in the lawsuit suggest that Missouri Gov. Mike Kehoe was willing to contact local planning officials ahead of a key rezoning vote, though his office did not respond to requests for comment, Politico reported.
Campaign finance records show that a political action committee backed by labor unions spent nearly $40,000 in support of the incumbent council members in the final weeks of the race, underscoring the economic stakes tied to the project and the jobs it could generate.
Opponents say the outcome should serve as a warning to local governments nationwide as they weigh large-scale data center projects.
Brian Freeman ✉
Brian Freeman, a Newsmax writer based in Israel, has more than three decades writing and editing about culture and politics for newspapers, online and television.
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