What the board voted on October 26
Davidson County’s board of commissioners voted 5 to 2 on Monday, October 26, to add rules for data centers to the county zoning ordinance. A zoning ordinance is the county law that says what can be built where. The rules apply to future proposals outside the county’s cities and towns. County officials say no data center proposal has been submitted yet. WFAE
The same night, the board voted 6 to 1 against a four month pause on new data center applications, choosing written standards instead. The Dispatch In August, the board had split 3 to 3 on a six month pause, so that earlier proposal also failed. Davidson Local
Special use permit conditions and setbacks for large AI data centers
The amendment changes the county’s table of permitted uses. It also sets the conditions a data center must meet to get a special use permit. Yahoo News A special use permit is an approval granted only after a public hearing where the applicant proves the project meets set standards. Under the county’s existing rules, the deciding board must find that the project protects public health and safety. The board must also find that the project will keep up or raise the value of adjoining land, or that the project is a public necessity. Zoning Ordinance
The amendment sorts data centers into groups by how much electricity they use, from small sites up to the largest AI facilities. The Dispatch At one commissioner’s request, large facilities are barred from the rural commercial, community shopping and residential districts. An applicant must file a site plan, a noise study, a vibration study, a lighting plan, an emergency operations plan and a plan for closing the facility.
A data center must sit at least 200 feet from the outer property line, 500 feet from residential and farm property, and 1,000 feet from schools, churches, child care centers and assisted living facilities. The rules require closed loop cooling or another low water method, and they bar private wells. Closed loop cooling sends the same water around the system again instead of drawing fresh water. Several residents asked for 1,000 feet from homes too.
How the county treated data centers before
Before this vote, the zoning ordinance did not define data centers at all. Yahoo News The rejected moratorium ordinance said the county would have been legally required to review a data center as a warehouse. Proposed moratorium ordinance In districts where the use table allows warehouses, they need only a zoning permit from staff, with no hearing. Zoning Ordinance The ordinary minimum distances in the two industrial districts run from 15 to 50 feet.
| What changed | Before October 26 | After October 26 |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Data centers were not a listed use | Data centers are defined and grouped by electricity use |
| Review | Treated like a warehouse and approved by staff | Special use permit conditions and development standards |
| Distance from neighbors | 15 to 50 feet in industrial districts | 200 feet from lot lines and 500 from homes and farms |
| Schools and churches | No separate distance | At least 1,000 feet away |
| Water | No cooling rule | Closed loop or low water cooling and no private wells |
| Filings | A site plan | Noise, vibration, lighting, emergency and closure plans |
What happens to sites already in the pipeline
The county’s own ordinance lets an applicant choose between the old and new rules when the rules change while its application is pending. Zoning Ordinance That choice only helps someone who filed before the change. County officials say no data center application had been filed. So a project that files now must meet the new standards.
Written zoning opinions are the harder case. A zoning opinion is a letter from county staff saying what the current rules allow on one specific parcel. After the August tie vote, the board’s vice chairman said the planning department had already given formal zoning opinions to one or two AI data center developers. He said those letters would let a developer build even if the county passed a moratorium. The Dispatch
That claim was about a moratorium, not about the new standards. Whether one of those letters lets a site avoid the new distances, studies and cooling rules is not settled. The question will come up if one of those developers files an application.
Tomorrow’s topic
The Ohio Supreme Court ruling on AI data center moratoriums and site plans.