Forcing data centers on West Virginians without giving them a say is not FAIR

In 2025, at Governor Morrisey’s request, the West Virginia Legislature’s Republican supermajority pushed through HB 2014, the Power Generation and Consumption Act, which removed local authority and public input on the placement and regulation of “high-impact” data centers. 

Your current local Greenbrier County representatives, Vince Deeds, Jeff Campbell, and Ray Canterbury, voted for HB 2014 and against your input.

The bill removed local authority over zoning, code enforcement, building permitting and inspection, license requirements, land use, noise, lighting, water use, and air pollution issues – essentially giving state entities regulatory authority over all the issues of critical importance to local residents. The legislation basically created a way for the state to fast-track the creation of data centers as more and more projects are proposed across the state. 

Residents no longer have a say in the way their local lands and resources are used. Projects can be pushed through without their approval or respect for their wishes, their landscape, their community priorities, or their way of life.

The Legislature also largely pulled the few potential economic benefits away from local jurisdictions. High-impact data centers are exempt from many normal sales and personal property tax liabilities, receive significant tax credits, and have some assets assessed at much lower values than normal property tax rates. 

In addition, under HB 2014, 70 percent of property tax revenue will go to the state, with just 30 percent staying with the county where the facility is located. Normally, the bulk of property tax revenues for a facility would stay in the county to fund schools and public services. A vote supporting this bill is a vote against public school funding.

A number of politicians claimed they were interested in amending the 2025 legislation to give local governments and citizens more say in the process and a larger share in revenue. Despite many opportunities to do so during the 2026 legislative session, that never happened. The Republican supermajority bowed to special interests.

HB 4822 would have redirected data center tax revenue to PEIA, counties, and schools. The Republican supermajority failed to support the bill. 

HB 4683 and HB 4832 protected groundwater and required high-impact data centers to report water use. The Republican supermajority again failed to support these bills. 

None of these bills made it out of the committee charged with giving them consideration. Instead, the Legislature passed a rules bill, House Bill 4983, that details how the Department of Commerce will approve and certify new high-impact data centers and microgrid districts provided for in 2025’s HB 2014. The bill was effective on passage on March 13, 2026.

HB 4983 states that developers who apply for certification must identify significant environmental risks or unreasonable burdens on nearby properties, schools, historic sites, or local water sources and provide that information to the Department of Commerce. The department is not required to verify or investigate the information provided by the developer, but department officials are required to keep the disclosures confidential. Under these rules, local residents and communities have no way of knowing what risks were identified or whether anything was done to mitigate the potential damage.

According to West Virginia Watch, “HB 4983 passed the House of Delegates in February. There, lawmakers voted down two amendments. One would have required developers to share specific details on where they would draw water from for operations, how much water they envision using and what impact that water usage could have on local residents. The other would have limited what water they could use, added transparency measures, implemented a 500 foot ‘buffer zone’ for the developments and allowed residents to petition proposals they believed could ‘significantly impact’ their communities.”

If elected, our Democratic candidates have vowed to restore local control so cities and counties can enforce local ordinances. 

Our candidates for the statehouse, Kent, Sarah, and Sarah, want to protect local groundwater and surface water and those who rely on it. They want to require water-use reporting and water protections for all West Virginians.

They would vote to redirect data centers’ tax revenues away from tax cuts for millionaires and toward priorities that help working West Virginians. They want to redirect data center tax revenue toward people, not just tax cuts.

They would vote to protect energy ratepayers and make sure data centers pay their own way, ideally lowering everyone’s rates rather than increasing citizens’ rates while negotiating sweetheart deals on their own power bills.

This is our chance to keep unwanted data centers out of Greenbrier County.

On November 3, vote for Kent Gilkerson for WV State Senate and whichever Sarah is on your ballot: Sarah Umberger for House District 46 (east of 219) or Sarah Morris for House District 47 (west of 219).