Anti-data center advocates gather in Capitol Rotunda to voice concerns

JEFFERSON CITY — An anti-data center news conference was held in the Missouri State Capitol Rotunda Wednesday morning in response to the closed local government data center summit hosted just across town by the Missouri Association of Counties. Rural residents from across Missouri such as Callaway County, Warren County, and Festus County came wearing the color red to show solidarity and send a united message: "no data centers" in their communities. One resident at the meeting, Jessica Slisz, said she represented the mothers and grandmothers of the Callaway community that worry about the environmental threats data centers pose to their children. The Missouri Association of Counties hosted a summit on Wednesday to discuss what artificial intelligence data centers could bring to the state. "This isn't just a Callaway County or Montgomery County issue... we're seeing this everywhere," Slisz said. "We want to ensure that our water is safe, that our farms are safe, that our children are safe." From St. Louis, Henry Iwenofu, a political activist who worked to stop the tax incentives for data center developments in Ferguson, supported the call for more transparency. "The promoter of the project came in and was not trying to give us the information at all, and they requested us to give them questions and they would answer whichever one they choose," Iwenofu said. "We felt that wasn't an open meeting." Iwenofu said he wants residents throughout the state to voice their concerns to local government officials and not feel alone in this process. "The power is with their hands, they can do something and fight," Iwenofu said. "You can fight the city hall and you can win— and to do so it requires organization." Kansas City Attorney Aaron Cook spoke during the anti-data center news conference to raise awareness around the lack of transparency local officials have given to their communities. "It went on for almost three years, where there were closed meetings," Cook said. "The agendas to these meetings, even though there were notices, gave no indication to anybody that there was an enormous facility going to be built in our city that would use four times the electricity of the entire city." Cook also called for more transparency from local officials across the state. "(Local officials need to) rectify it by hitting the pause button and enacting a moratorium to just say 'We're going to actually open the doors to discuss this more fully, understand all of the implications, instead of just taking the word of the developer as the gospel truth,'" Cook said. "We need to open this up and consider the full perspective of the problems out there." Residents at the news conference in Jefferson City said they plan to keep speaking out and protesting. "We are a part of the Show-Me State," Slisz said. "We want these corporations to come in and show us that they are caring about us at a minimum."