I'd like everybody to take a seat. I want to welcome our guests as
well as especially of our staff members who are joining the meeting tonight.
I see you back there, jerome.
as is our tradition, we'll have an invocation, justice mccoy, and then a
pledge of allegiance will be led by justice lewison. We'll call the roll and then
there we'll pause for some folks who are going to speak to us a little bit
about the utilities on this data center.
so if you can stand, please do.
dear heavenly father, we thank you for this day. We thank you for this gathering. We thank you for this body.
we thank you for the people who are here tonight. Dear lord, we ask you to be with us
on the items that we have to consider. Lord, please give us wisdom, discernment, and so forth.
and we ask for your blessing on this body and our actions tonight and in the near future.
it's in your son's name we pray. Amen. Amen. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the united
states of america, madam
clerk, when you're ready, please call the roll. Certainly. Ms.
davis. Present. Ms. Capps. Listen.
here. Ms. Blackwood.
mr. Persons. Here. Ms. Massey.
here. Ms. Curry. Present. Mr. Keith. Here. Ms.
ward. Here. Ms. Young-baker? Here. Mr.
robinson? Here. Mr. Mccoy? Here. Mr. Stowers?
present. Mr. Elliott? Here. Ms. Medlock?
13 present, 2 absent.
thank you, madam clerk. And members, we have some guests that made a request
to come and speak for a few minutes. It is our economic developer
and head of the regional chamber, jay cheshire, has with him...
I think ms. Landrieu, the president or
chair of entergy, whichever is appropriate there, as well as the central
arkansas water, mr. Bohannon is with us, and I
think we have one or two others. They'll speak for a few minutes
each, and then they'll take questions from the members of this body, the quorum court,
and once we're done with that, then we'll move on and get busy
with our work. Cheshire, would you please
begin by stating your name?
and I am a resident of pulaski county.
go ahead. Thank you, judge, and thank you, members of the quorum court. We appreciate the opportunity
to come and visit a little bit more. When I was here before, I talked about some of the
things that had been discussed in a press conference earlier that day in regard to a lot of
these questions. That are being asked and need to be answered.
and we talked about also a new website. That website is lr data
centers facts. Both centers and facts have an
s on the n dot com where a lot of this information is also readily available.
as the judge has already stated,
we have a vice president of entergy arkansas, ventrell
thompson, with us along with the president and ceo. Of entergy, laura landreau, we
have john bethel, the former executive director of the arkansas public service
commission that can answer a lot of the other regulatory questions. Currently, the director of
public initiatives and relations for entergy. We also have tad bohannon, who
is the ceo of central arkansas water and also can address questions in regard
to where we are on the wastewater aspect of this process.
or excuse me, project as well. So again, we started this
process many, many years ago, when I say many, two and a half years ago.
we've been doing our best in trying to establish opportunities
for conversations in regard to answering these questions.
and so I know instead of me standing here and talking so that you guys have an
opportunity to ask questions of all of us at the end, I would like to bring
to the podium vice president ventrell thompson to talk about
the electric energy aspect first and we'll go from there.
ventrell. Thank you, jay. Ventro, welcome. Glad to have you. And I heard somebody's phone
going off, so would everybody in the room please quiet your phones?
thank you. Good evening. How are you all doing today? We're doing very good. We're popular.
well, thank you for giving us the opportunity to be here today.
you know, there's been a lot of conversations around data centers across the state,
particularly here in central arkansas. As you can see by the standing
room only, a lot
of people are trying to understand what does this mean for pulaski county, what does
this mean for arkansas, what does this mean for the power grid, and also what does this mean
for your electric bill. And so I want to take, my goal here today is to answer
those questions directly and in a way that gives not only you,
but the residents of the county and the state.
some assurances that we are protecting the interest
of our existing customers, and that is at the forefront of every decision that we're
making. And those decisions that we're making, I want to assure you
that they're being validated and they're being approved by the public service
commission, who has the exclusive right of regulating public utilities here in the state.
and so I want to start by correcting one of the... Biggest misconceptions that
I've heard and that is these data centers are not being
built on the backs of arkansas residents and businesses.
for anyone who says that, it's just not true.
that's not what the facts say. Large customers like google and avayo are required
to pay the full cost of the infrastructure to serve them.
full stop. Those costs will not be shifted to other residential and
business customers. In fact, when companies like
google and avail, when they build infrastructure right here
in arkansas, they bring significant new revenue
to our system that's over and above the cost to serve them.
and so that additional revenue, what it does is it then helps to put downward pressure.
on residential customers, small businesses, and local industries.
because when these customers pay their full cost to share,
I mean full cost of service, and they also absorb other
existing costs on the grid, arkansas customers stand to benefit to the tune of $1.7
billion in savings over the life of those contracts.
as a regulated utility... Our responsibility first and foremost is
to protect the families, businesses, and communities that rely
on us every day. That means maintaining affordability, protecting
reliability, and making sure that growth benefits all of our customers,
not just a few. So it's also important to remember that arkansas is
already experiencing significant growth from new industries looking
to locate into our state. And also from existing businesses that are expanding
right here. Over the next five years, energy usage in arkansas is
expected to increase, or expected to continue to increase, and that's going
to be driven by industrial expansion, community growth, and the involving energy needs
of our customers. Many of the advantages that
arkansas enjoys today, including some of the lowest utility rates
in the country are the result of investments that were made
by leaders decades ago. Ventro, will you turn the
microphone up? Point it towards you. There you go. Thank you.
is that better? That is better. And those decisions that those leaders made years ago,
they helped arkansas grow then, and the decisions we make today
will help shape the future opportunities that are right here in the state.
and to meet this growing demand, entergy arkansas is
making smart investments with new generation resources to serve this demand.
these investments are not only here to make sure that we're
meeting future demand, but they also help modernize our system
and strengthen reliability all across the state.
and I want to be very clear on this next point. We will not move forward with
serving any new data centers. Unless we can maintain or
improve the existing reliability for our customers.
this is how we plan for our grid in a responsible way. Our responsibility is to ensure
that we have the infrastructure in place to reliably serve growth,
whether it's from a data center or whether it's from wellspawn
announcing an expansion or whether it's from one of our
steel customers who's also... Looking to expand. Our job is to make sure that we
have the power available when they need it. In fact, we have an obligation
to make sure that we have the power that they need, along with all the power for all of
our residential customers as well. So we absolutely understand and
recognize the issues that are being raised
across the country, whether that's across the river in memphis with some of the environmental
concerns that are there. Or whether it's in the northeast part of the country where we're hearing
about rates increasing tremendously.
those situations just simply do not reflect what's happening right here in arkansas.
our regulatory framework, our energy mix, our cost structure
for our customers, all of that is set up differently than some of these other areas that you might hear about
on the national scale. And so we... Actually have protections
in place specifically designed to protect arkansas customers. And a key part
of that protection is our fair share plus pledge.
before we agree to serve any data center, we perform extensive analysis
to ensure that we can deliver the power that they need without compromising
reliability for all of our existing customers.
at its core, fairshare plus is built on two things, or seeks
to accomplish two things. One, it ensures that all of the data centers pay their full
cost to serve. And secondly, it creates additional value
for all of our existing customers. And, you know, one example
of that is in google's project in west memphis. In addition to their project,
they also announced a $25 million energy impact fund,
which supports energy efficiency and weatherization initiatives,
workforce development in crittenden county, and ai
opportunities across arkansas.
and so fairshare plus can be summed up in essentially three commitments.
the first commitment is strong financial protections.
these agreements that we have in place are long-term contracts that have strict
collateral requirements. They also have guaranteed
revenue structures that ensure data centers pay the full cost
to serve them and for the infrastructure needed
to serve them and for all of the additional benefits that we're going to be asking them
to pay for the existing costs on the grid.
secondly. Reliability and power quality protections.
we will not move forward with any project unless the infrastructure is in place to serve the new demand.
we also require these facilities to invest in equipment and standards to
help protect the grid and maintain service quality for all of our customers.
and third, accountability and long-term value for all arkansans.
every one of these projects. Are subject to oversight by the arkansas public
service commission, while they also are supporting investments in clean energy resources that
also are going to strengthen our grid for the future. So together, this is what the
fair share plus pledge does. It ensures that all of those financial obligations that are
tied to serving data centers stick with those customers and not
shift and are not shifted to our residential customers. Instead, we plan to benefit
through strong reliability, economic growth,
and long-term value for our customers.
again, the decisions that we're making today will shape arkansas' energy future
for decades to come, and we're committed to getting this right.
the strategic investments that we are building for our customers do more than just keep the lights on.
they are powering opportunity. They're strengthening
communities. They're supporting jobs and they're ensuring arkansas maintains competitive
for the future. Entergy arkansas is a fully
regulated utility and every major investment we make is subject to strict oversight and
review. That transparency and accountability is built
into every project, every agreement, and every rate decision that we present
to the public service commission.
this is the standard we're holding ourselves to and this is the standard that we intend to keep for our customers.
and so at this time, I'm happy to answer questions along
with the other members of our team.
thank you so much for being here. Thank you for your presentation. And I think that just for efficiency's sake,
we'll change from everybody making their presentation before we have questions.
and individually, you can ask some questions. So, justice davis, I think I
saw your light lit up first. Did you have a question for vitro?
wait a minute. There you go. Sorry about that. Thank you.
approximately what percent of avr's power needs will be generated on site using natural gas?
zero. There won't be any on site,
as I understand it. That's not, okay, go ahead. I'm looking at the website and
it's not what it says on avr. As I understand it, we are going to be serving the evalio
contract from the transmission grid. If they will have any backup
generation on-site, that is the decision that they will employ, but we will not be serving
their load with on-site generation.
okay, because that's not what it says on the website. I can assure you that we do not
plan on serving their needs with on-site generation.
they will be served from the grid. It says a gas pipeline.
from kendra morgan, ngpl. Entergy arkansas will not be
serving the needs of avio through on-site generation.
we will be serving them through the grid. But avio could have that
pipeline. I'm not aware of their, I'm not aware of their, they
may could have a pipeline, but I'm not so sure what that pipeline will serve. But it won't serve their
primary. Energy needs we're serving
their primary energy needs through the transmission grid
okay thank you it says it's starting in 2027 so that might be why the rest of us don't know about it
but I guess it might be in the the wood work somewhere so I yield thank you uh yes um you say you have strict regulations
by the epa.
the epa has been cut 55 to 65 percent since donald trump has
become president. So I want to know where are epa regulations, what's been cut
out of our epa regulations right now? I can't answer the questions
about what's been cut out of our epa regulations. My comments were that we were
regulated by the arkansas public service commission and all of the all of the requirements that are put upon
us to provide safe reliable power to all of our customers we have to make sure that we're abiding
by all of those current statutes that are in place. The arkansas public service
commission though is also is it not run by handpicked by sarah sanders that she picks
every single person on that and that I want to know what those standards are.
what the apsc standards are for us to operate. Well, those are standards that have been in place
for a long time. So she has not changed any standards since she's been in office?
I can't speak to any standards that the governor has changed since I've been in office, or since she's been in office. But what I can tell you is that
we are bound by the strict rules and regulations of the
arkansas public service commission that have been in place and that are public, that we have to abide by those.
we will ensure that we do that. Also, second question, you're going to be using like
150 megawatts. It says up to 150 megawatts. It says that also you will
probably have to have new power grids because of this and that you might have to have, you know,
something built later on because of how much power
you're using. And that may be put back on to the customers.
so if you build something so that you guys can have more power, if we have
to build more electric, you know, electrical or nuclear plants or whatever we've got
to build in order to keep your facility running, who's that going to be put back on?
all of the infrastructure, all of the generation and the transmission assets that are
going to be needed to serve hyperscale data centers are going to be paid exclusively by
the hyperscale data centers. So you would pay
for a nuclear power plant to be built, not us?
any cost to generate and transmit electricity costs to
the hyperscale data centers are going to be paid by the hyperscaler.
we have to make sure that we have enough power to serve all customers.
and without a data center, we're still going to be required to make sure
that we have adequate generation, adequate transmission, and other resources to make
sure that when you flip the switch, the lights stay on. Sure, but if you go up to 150
megawatts, you're going to have to have a lot more, aren't you?
so one of the things that I've heard about is about everyone's talking about megawatts and the size that
we're going to need to serve these facilities. We have customers today that
use way more power than that, and they do not cause issues on our grid.
in fact, we build to serve the specific needs
of the customers. And because we're going to be building
to support the needs of those specific customers and requiring them to pay the cost
to do so, that's how, that's why I can assure you that those costs won't be shifted
to other customers. So you're telling me you have customers right now that are
going to be using as much power as a data center.
I can assure you right now that there are customers in arkansas today that are going
to be using. No, that do it right now, that are using enough, as much power.
okay. Multiple, multiple customers. And that's why I want to make sure that I understand.
and that's why I proposed a bill for high-density infrastructure, and it wasn't just for data
centers. I proposed something for high-density infrastructure. I proposed something so that we
could look at all high-density infrastructure. Well, I think one
of the things that I want to make sure that you, along with the other members of the
quorum court, understand is that we go through a stringent process to
ensure that we have enough power to serve. All of our customers. We do an integrated resource
plan that identifies, and it looks out 20 years, and it looks out of all of the
need that we're going to, all of the demand that we're going to need to make sure that we
are planning appropriately to put the facilities and the infrastructure in place
to meet those needs. And so I can assure you that we have plans in place that the
arkansas public service commission holds us and all
other utilities. In arkansas accountable for
to make sure that we're going to have enough power to serve the needs of all the customers.
so you can guarantee me right now that you are never going to increase my rate because
of a data cell. You can guarantee me 100% and show me it in writing.
we have contracts with those customers that ensure that
they're going to pay all of the costs to serve them.
those costs... Are going, those costs are baked into the
contracts that they sign, that the apsc approves,
that ensure that they're going to pay not only the costs
for the infrastructure to serve them, but also all of the power that they're going
to use while they're in service over the 20 years of that contract, and they're going to be paying
for additional costs because they're part of the grid. That's where that $1.7 million
in additional benefits. Are coming from because the
revenues that they pay us are going to far supersede the costs and that is going
to be a benefit to all other customers and that is one thing that that's that's a benefit
of having this growth here in arkansas is because if we do it
right we're going to have the opportunity to benefit from the growth the
economic development we're also going to be able to strengthen our grid and we're also going
to be able to help keep rates low. Our rates today are 22% below the national average.
and they're not there because by chance. That's because of the planning. That's because
of the diligence that goes into the work that we do to make sure that we're keeping the lights on.
and we are committed to doing that. And those data centers,
they're going to pay their costs. Well, I would like to see that in writing, and I would like
to see you bring it to me in writing so that I know that they will not pay. They are going to pay for their
nuclear power plants they're going to build, and they're going to pay for all of the costs, and nothing's going
to be shifted to any of these people out here. That is the pledge. That is the pledge that we've
made. It's a pledge, though.
it's a pledge. I want it in writing. I want it in writing.
I want it in legal writing. It is a pledge that has been confirmed and fortified.
if everybody would just kind of hold it down and let's allow this process to go so that we can get
through all the speakers, get through all the questions, and be respectful
of each other all along. Thank you. So fair share plus pledge.
is what we're committing to make sure that every contract we sign,
that those parameters get baked into the contracts that actually are approved by the
public service commission. So, yes, those contracts are binding agreements that they
will have to abide by. Yes.
okay, so they're not just a pledge then. They're an actual... Legal binding contract that you
are going to pay for everything and nobody's ever going to have any other rates raised. That is correct.
now keep in mind that those are the costs for the to serve that individual customer.
we still have to make sure that we keep right the available
infrastructure up to up to par and in speed up to par for all
of our other customers outside of a data center. Those things still happen. We still have to trim trees.
we still have to create get the lights back on after a tornado comes through or a straight line
winds. We still have to do that, and we're going to continue
to do that. So if you're seeing rate increases, they're because of our operations in our business.
they are not because of data centers because data centers are going to pay their cost.
I yield.
good evening, ventrell. Pleasure to have you here. Good evening. Outside of what has already
been granted by the psc, has entergy requested any further rate increases?
right now, we have a rate case
that is pending before the public service commission. Nothing in that rate proceeding is related to data centers.
are you able to go more in-depth on that pending case?
yes, it is a, and I do have some of my colleagues here that can help me answer some
of those questions if needed. But how far do you want to go into it? How much more outside of,
again, what has already been granted? I mean, that's already known, but outside of that, how much
more is this new case requesting?
is the new rate case requesting? Yes. I don't have that information exactly, but
for residential customers, it's less than a dollar. It's less than a dollar increase on the bills.
and subject to check, because I'm not looking at the information in front of me, but subject to check,
but the residential increases are less than a dollar, right
around a dollar. Roger that.
any other questions? Thank you,
sir. I appreciate your time, and thank you for being here to answer these questions. Thank you.
thank you, ventrell, and also we'll have other folks that can answer these as well as we go
forward. Now I'd like to bring up the ceo of the central arkansas
water system, tad bohannon, who can talk about all of the
questions surrounding water. Tad? Hello.
good evening, everybody. How are we doing?
it's been a few years since I've been here. I think the last time I was here we were talking about
lake maumelle watershed. So glad to be back to talk
with you all again. For a few of the things that I'm going
to address, I'm going to have very similar answers to what entergy has already presented.
and there's a number of questions, and we get the same questions.
and the first one is, will my water bill increase because of a data center?
so I'll answer that in much like the energy and say no.
but I'll also answer it to say, for instance, in 2023, we adopted a 10-year rate
resolution, and we have told... All of our customers and elect
bodies that we will live within that rate resolution through 2032.
okay, there are rate increases already built into that rate resolution,
but they have nothing to do with data centers. They're with replacing our
existing infrastructure that is aged. We have 100-year-old pipes
in the ground. Frequently, there's a discussion of, well, out of sight, out of mind.
and one of the things that I started doing when I first became ceo is we have to start
addressing this aging infrastructure that's in the ground.
one of the things that the data center brings is we've said, ok, if you want
to put a data center here to go get that water, you've got
to go this far west. Ok, and so you've got to put
in new infrastructure to bring that water to the facility.
first of all, the infrastructure that we've told them that they've got to put
in will not only provide water for them, but it will replace aging infrastructure that
provides water to the entire area. So that is infrastructure that
needs to be replaced that will not have to be paid for by the individual residents and the
individual customers that we have in that area. So there is an aspect
of this project on the water side that replaced it. Replaces aged infrastructure
to the benefit of every customer that we have. And it eliminates the need
to spread that cost across those customers,
okay? The other thing that we've heard about is water supply.
we are very fortunate. In the 1930s, our people that came before us built lake winona.
and then in the 1950s, they built lake baumel.
and those two lakes provide the water that this community needs.
in fact, those two lakes provide the water for a half million people, not just within pulaski
county, but up into cabot and down into saline county. There's water that's provided
to the half million people in the metropolitan area,
not just here. And our responsibility, our number one responsibility,
is protecting public health by providing outstanding water
services and we know that that is our purpose okay so we have the water that is available to
serve those half million people and there's been lots of talk about numbers and everything
the safe yield of those two lakes is they could provide 120 million gallons a day and
you go okay what does that mean that means each and every day they could provide 120 million
gallons a day without degrading. The level
of the lake or the water quality within the lake, right? We don't come close to that.
our average day now is about 67 million gallons a day.
we can treat up to 156 million gallons a day.
so on a peak day, we can go all the way up, even though the lakes can only provide 120.
that's if we took it each and every day. We get to a peak day
in the middle of august, when everybody's got their lawn sprinklers on, we can go up to 156 million gallons a day.
we are already pre-data center in the midst of a $230 million
upgrade of the wilson treatment plant, which is the big one out on 430, and you see
the big dome of the clear well with the water in it right there.
and so we're already upgrading that facility so that we can be able to provide additional water
to the community. Then you hear, well, data centers are going
to take 4 million gallons a day. All right? That's 4 million peak.
our ordinary residents peak at 3x a normal day.
just by watering their lawns all the time and their sprinklers and what have you, they add additional demand that
we're able to meet. So in their peak that they're talking about taking, it's 10
days out of a year. All right?
so we know and we have the capacity to be able to build for that. We can do it.
bertrell talked about planning out. We have a 2050 strategic plan.
we have a 2100 asset management plan. Water utilities do not think
in terms of three years or four years. We think in terms of decades
of meeting demand and reaching out and providing for that demand.
and that won't change. The ability to treat I've
already talked about. Will the data centers be able to say for it? No.
the other thing that helps us out with this is we, first of all, we do not have a contract
with aveo yet for water supply. All right.
that has not been negotiated out yet. There's been some preliminary
discussions, but it's not there yet. But there are things for us to look at to say,
for instance, in our existing rate structure,
there's a $65 million project to build a third water treatment,
a third raw water line to come from lake maumelle to the wilson treatment plant for redundancy.
so that if something happens to one of our two existing lines that we already have,
we have a... Third one to make sure that we can get raw water for the treatment plant.
that's an item that can be discussed with folks coming in.
we have rights to go to lake de grey to get additional water if we need to go to lake de grey
to get additional water. We've had those rights in total since 2017 and we have
had an option on those going back to 1988. So we have been looking
out far as to how to get additional water from here.
the other thing to look at, and you see this with data centers all over the country that I've been talking
to, and believe me, the network of ceos for water utility is a pretty tight
group, and we talk to each other and we learn from each other, all right? But if we could cut our
unaccounted for water in half, and we're very good,
by the way, on unaccounted for water. We're usually running around less than 10%, okay?
but if we can cut that in half, we can save 2.5 million gallons of water per day.
okay? Now, the question comes up for rate payers, given that our water cost is,
is it worth chasing, is it worth increasing your rates
to go chase that unaccounted for water? All right?
but with new users coming on that are high demand, that are looking for ways to offset, their demand,
we can look to them and say, hey, is there a possibility that you could help us with reducing unaccountable water
to offset what you're going to be taking? And that doesn't change the
amount of water that's coming
out of the water treatment plants and the amount of water that's being pulled from the lakes or anything else.
so there's lots of options for as we move forward with the discussions with the water center.
and just know that just like you are here, we have a board made up of seven citizens that live right
here and drink all of our water. And they are just as concerned
about protecting the water and protecting the availability of water and protecting the public
health of the people they serve as you all are.
so from a water standpoint, what I can say is that, yes, we've looked
at this project. Yes, there is an opportunity for us to be able to provide water
to this. Project, but it works out to be a net benefit for the
community.
I'll leave it with that.
thank you, tad. Justice medlock, you were first, you're recognized
for a question. Can you please put the
microphone up to your mouth? Thank you.
thank you. Hi, thank you for that. I appreciate that.
your 10-year rate increase plan, so if the data center did
offset and take on some of that cost for some
of the water expenses, would you revise that and not do some of that increase?
yes and no. Okay, here's the yes part. There is a specific
infrastructure fee within that that is to pay the cost.
one of the things that's to pay the cost of is the new raw water line from lake maumelle to the
wilson treatment plant. If we don't have to underdo that cost,
that infrastructure fee has to be tied to costs that we incur.
so if we don't incur that cost, then it could be offset, and that would not go up as high as
it's going up. Okay? The other, we have plenty
of infrastructure that needs to be replaced. And that's not what this
conversation is about, all right? But it is this. We were replacing, 2016 when I
became ceo, we were replacing pipe at once every 400 years.
pipe doesn't last in the ground 400 years.
the rates that you're talking about that are in place through 2032 get us to
to replacing pipe once every 200 years.
we need to get that to admit at a minimum of once every 100 years.
I just feel like if we're getting all of this benefit from the center,
that it should be passed along to the customers and not increase as much.
I understand what you're saying, but I also understand that we still have a lot of unanswered needs.
thank you for that. Okay.
justice stowers, you lit up
next. Thank you, sir. Mr. Bohannon, thank you for being here this evening.
my question is that I have read several statistics that the
average data center uses the equal amount of water that an
18-hole golf course does in a year. Can you confirm that or provide
some context? To that statistic that is
out there?
within our system,
it's close. I mean, I can tell you we have
a commercial customer.
that is not a hospital and not what you would say. It doesn't matter how much water they need. We're going
to provide it no matter what. But we have another commercial customer that they use
about the same amount of water every day as a data center.
I mean, so golf courses, it depends.
if you go back and look a few years ago, yes, that was a requirement. I will say.
golf courses have gotten better about managing their water. I know that's not a direct
answer for your question. No, I appreciate it. Now, justice elliott, you're
recognized for a question. Thank you for coming tonight.
I need to ask you about how much have you done in the maumau area?
that's my question, and then I have another question after that.
so when we first... Consolidated with mommel, we built a pipeline to go to
mommel and that's been done and we are replacing service lines
as fast as we can and we're trying to replace all the pvc
pipe that was put in as fast as we can. What I'll add to that though is
that cost is not being shared across the entire rate base.
when we took on the, just like we would do with dasims, when we took on the maumelle
project of consolidating indoor systems, we said, maumelle residents, your system needs
to move from this standard to caw standards. And you're going to pay a surcharge
on your bill on top of regular water costs until those improvements are paid
off. And believe me, they know they're paying it because I hear about it regularly,
and I'm sure you do too. So another question is about the payments.
we have on payment, my mail, then you have north little
rock on my bill. And that's another $75 or
whatever. But what is the average water bill for a my mail resident
should be, is my question. The average water bill
for a my mail customer. The average bill, depending on
whether or not you're irrigating, would say right around $22 a month just for the
water and the base charge, $23 a month. And then you tack on top of
that the two surcharges that are still on the water bill. So that bill's pushing, I've got to do the math, $70 a
month probably, maybe. Well, my bill's $250 a month.
well, you might have a leak. No, I've already checked that out. I, you know. I've had two plumbers come out, and even we can't understand
why it is. Do you know what your average,
do you know what your monthly consumption is in ccf?
okay. What's that? Well, I had to look again, but what I'm saying is I've had all
that checked. I do not have a leak, and even the neighbors have come and
asked us some questions about this. We can't understand why our bill is so much higher than it
was before that was started, is what I'm saying. Before all the construction was started,
that's what I'm trying to get across. It's a heck of a lot higher.
I'd be happy to come out to
maumelle and talk to anybody in maumelle and bring all the maumelle information. If you will remember back in
2015 when this started, maumelle water corporation
announced that they were going to be doubling the water rates to be able to build a new
treatment plant. We brought the financial information forward and said, here's the alternative,
and that's what they voted to do. So I'd be happy to come talk
to anybody. You want me to come talk to any group you want me to come talk to in montmel to
talk about? I appreciate it.
are you finished, paul?
I think next was justice person.
good evening. Thank you for being here. So is little rock water
reclamation here as well? They are not. This project is in pulaski county in wooden.
got it. Got it. Good. Okay. So. My number one question when it
comes to water, I guess, pertains to quality of life. So we hear that data centers
can cool their equipment or their servers one or two ways,
electricity or water cooling systems. The more electricity, the less water.
the more water, the less electricity. All right. So if they run water
through these systems. They are treating this water, this wastewater,
through the system before they send it back out to the environment.
am I right so far? They will have to meet adeq
discharge requirements if they're going to discharge directly.
we do not have a wastewater contract with them yet. We are not traditionally a
wastewater utility. Right. I want to say that right off the bat.
right.
but we do operate. Own and operate the wrightsville wastewater treatment facility and that came about due to necessity we were asked to
do that and it is operating is operating properly now understood that's great oh I'm
sorry go ahead so we'll have to deal
with the wastewater just like we'll have to contract with them
on the water okay and uh so just to point a point to that um all right.
it sounds great, and it is great. You treat your water before you release it back out
to the environment. However, what we don't want to
happen is the water is too sanitized for the environment and it's too well treated
because if it's going to be used as wastewater, there are certain ph balances
level, and I'm sorry to bore everybody with this science, that is needed in order to
break down. Micro bacteria whatever so you
may not have a contract right now but there needs
to be a vested interest in making sure that any waters release is not overly
sanitizing this to a point where I'm not 100% familiar
with adq standards for releasing water
but that's why I was kind of hoping reclamation was here but nevertheless I just want to
know your viewpoint and where are those talks even happening?
yes. And I mean, I don't want to get too far out
over my ski sort of thing. But the other look at it when it comes out, that is,
are there other uses we can use for it? Correct. And I think that's really important for both rate payers
and for. The environment and community. You know,
we have five big drops in our 2050 strategic plan and environmental sustainability is
one of them that we want to make sure that we are doing right and being sustainable
in the environment. So we will continue to follow that.
and to make sure that they treat their water as well and have particular guidelines and parameters
to make sure that water, if and when it's released, meets a certain standard
environmentally. As you said, we don't I don't want killing the bugs.
that take care of the wastewater.
I'll be too toxic or too sanitized. That is correct. All right.
iu.
you yield? Yes, sir. Thank you. I think mr.
mccoy was next.
thank you, ted. Thanks for being here. Appreciate it. So I'm going to beat my colleague
to the punch probably, but I've been immersing myself in data centers the last couple
of weeks, as you can imagine, and one of the main concerns I
have is the water issue, not so much the capability to provide, but as justice
persons was saying. As he was alluding to in his concern
with water quality, with aveo's project that's coming up
in pulaski county, you mentioned you've had some talks
with them. Can you talk about their usage? How much can you disclose
about their usage, their plans for usage of water? I'll start there first. Can you describe what their
operation is going to look like in usage of water?
yes, and I think part of that has already been out in the open dialogue.
and I think they're here, so they might be able
to answer better than me. But if they do it, it's a phased-in approach.
and they're talking about starting with a max day that is much lower than the 4
million gallons or numbers that you've been hearing. With an average day of around 200,000.
gallons on an average day and then potentially growing from there depending
on what they do on their campus.
okay so what I've what I found out is it's a closed loop system so I guess they're
capturing rainwater and so forth can you speak to that? And I think all
of you know I'm a logger by trade right so I don't mean um that doesn't mean I haven't
learned a whole lot, too, but I just want to throw that out there.
but part of the thing that attracts them to our water is an economic driver.
our water is so good that people want to use it.
and it is no different than data centers in that one of the things that we've been told is
that they're going to be able to recirculate this water several times
through their facility before they have to discharge it because
of the water quality. So, yes, there is a closed-loop
system that they are bringing water in. They're recirculating it
several times
through their system, and then it's being discharged going out
after. I think the last numbers I heard were six to seven times that they could recirculate. The water
through our system. So that's, I don't know that I answered your question other
than just to tell you that yes, it's my understanding that it's a
closed loop system too and that they will be recirculating our
water several times. And would you find that an appropriate method for water usage of a data center?
yes. I wish more people could figure out a way to close loop their
system and use the water over and over and over again. Okay, I yield.
justice blackwood, I think you're up for questions. Okay.
since this is one reason we have one of the moratorium,
you do not have a contract. That's correct. And so we don't know what
you're going to do, and we don't know what's going to happen. And so we need to have some
time to be able to see what... You're going to be doing and what so the public can come in
and look and have because we worked hard to get this water. I was here when we did all the
water and it was a long hard job to get the kind
of water that we've got in pulaski county and I really really would hate anything
to happen to our water. So without a contract without us knowing where what you're
going to do it makes it really hard for us to say, oh yeah,
whatever you do, it's going to be fine. We need to, that's one reason I
really am strongly for the moratorium. Also, I would like to say, can you list any place in
america today where utilities have gone down, where they've put
in data centers?
I cannot, but I'm not going to tell you that that hadn't
happened. Okay. Then also you said.
it's gone down also because they put in a nestle bottled water plant too.
okay. Also, you said that we were using three times.
you gave the figure of the amount of water that we were using today was, was it three times?
yeah, our max day ever is 126 million gallons a day. Our minimum day is around 43 million gallons a day,
so you multiply that times three, and all the rest of that is hot weather usage,
mostly irrigation. Okay, so then you said that... And I may be wrong on this.
I'm trying to understand whether I'm right or not. Then you said that the data
center might use four times, so would it just go up one? Is that what you're telling me? You said it would go
to four times. The differential between their average use or their minimum use and then what their maximum
use would be, it won't increase. When we're running 126 million
gallons a day, which, by the way, we've only done one.
a handful of days last year where we had more than 100
million gallons a day being used.
2012. Okay. 2012, we went to 126. So, but I'm just trying
to get, because you said three and the four times, and so I'm trying to understand what you were telling me.
you said... Data center doesn't take us to four times our...
okay, so that's incorrect what you told me. Okay. Sorry. Because you said that would be
10 days and four times, and so I just wanted to make sure either that was correct or incorrect.
also, the infrastructure. Will this affect the infrastructure
of our water plant, of our water facilities? It will not impact the
infrastructure of our treatment plant. They will have to build a line
to go west to get the water. Okay. That line will serve more than
just their needs. Okay. So who is going to pay for that line?
they are. They will. Okay. And then I also want
to know what the impact is on the groundwater and the wetlands.
we have, it has been stated several times that they will not be able to use groundwater.
we have no control over that, but that's what's been... It's stated.
it's stated. And we have no contract, so we don't know.
so, and the wetlands, our water doesn't impact wetlands. I mean, our water coming
through its pipe system, getting from lake momel to the wilson treatment plant
or to the ozark treatment plant and then to the site that's located on 145th street is not a
wetlands impact.
okay, and so what about the, if we have a drought, if we have any kind
of a drought, how do we have, would we be totally okay if we
have a drought? We are 3.78 feet lower this
year than we were last year. We have had half the rain
january through. June, we're almost to june,
january through june, we're 13 inches down in rain from last year. We still have plenty
of water. Okay, and so with the water
that you're saying that you're going to I guess they're going to the wastewater that comes
off of this. And I've watched senate hearing after senate hearing, I have,
and they hold up a jar. Of this awful,
awful brown water. And they say, this is what's coming off of the data centers and this is
what's happening in these plants. And I've watched it over and over again because I'm a c-span
junkie. So this is something that
frightens me with our water, you know, that we are going to have pollution
in our water. Our water is going to be destroyed. And without a contract, I just
can't see that we could go forward. Until we've got a contract, until we have a moratorium, I
just can't say that we can handle this.
I understand what you're saying.
okay. I also understand that maumelle customers would hold up jars of water and saying,
this is what's coming out of our tap, and we corrected that.
I can also say that the community of perla was saying, look at what's coming out
of our tap. And we were appointed receiver of that system,
and now they have clear tap. I mean, so our central
arkansas water has an obligation, and I will speak
on behalf of our employees that they have an internal drive to
protect water quality and take care of water and make sure that. We no longer live
in a linear water environment. We live in a circular water environment.
that the linear water environment, that ship has sailed that you just kind
of go run it through, discharge it, it's all done. We now live in a circular water environment and every aspect
of that water environment has to be taken care of. And we understand that as part
of our duty and our obligation to take care of the entire circle.
and we will continue to work on that,
and we will every day. I mean, I have to get up every day and look
in the mirror and say, are we doing a good job? And that is an awesome feeling,
but it's also an incredible responsibility. I was just talking
to a lady who said, you don't understand how big a responsibility you have because
you have never.
gone without water. I don't ever want
to get there. We are going to take care of it to make sure that we do
not get there. All right. We live
in this community. I have a 20 year old son who I hope is going to live
in this community. I mean, this is not just a, here comes an industry and can
we provide them water? It doesn't work that way. This is a...
this is a growing community and does this provide a net positive benefit?
now, whether or not you all want a data center, that's your job.
my job is if we're having it, I'm going to make sure that we provide it
with the water that it needs
without impacting all of our other rate customers to say, hey, if you want water, you've got to go to here
to get it. And then I want to make sure that if we have wastewater
response, responsibility, that that side of it's taken care
of too. I mean, we are in, we are in wrightsville taking care of wastewater, not because we
said, hey, let's get into the wastewater business, but because there was a
community that was not being taken care of. We went to perla, not because
we said, let's drive an hour and 15 minutes
down the road and help take care of the community. I went out and met with neighbors who had sewage.
flowing through their front yards. And I said,
we have the ability to help. And so we tackled that task. Just like energy,
if there's a business that comes within our water service territory that says we need
water, we say as long as you're willing to pay
for the infrastructure, and that is not new for us. If a developer who wants
to build a 50... Lot subdivision, you've got to put in the infrastructure
to get it done. We don't pay for it. We don't take your ratepayer
money and use it to put that infrastructure in. We say you guys have got
to pay to put that in. And that's something that we do every day.
and so when you say we don't have a contract, I understand what you're saying.
all I can tell you is we haven't let you down so far.
I mean, you know, and I truly think you are probably very
sincere. I think that you probably mean this, but the problem is when
you're dealing with big business, when you're dealing with corporate power,
when you're dealing with huge billion dollar companies, things happen.
and they happen all the time and they seem to happen not in the benefit of the public.
they are never in the benefit of the public as far as I can tell. So that's where I think it's
not you. I think it's more the corporations that we're afraid
of. Okay. And I yield. Thank you.
thank you for that. And, folks, in the interest of time, because this is going to be a late night, please try
and keep your conversations down. You can go in the hallway to have those.
and also the amount of cheering, or booing. Let's be courteous
to everyone and get through this. Justice ward, even though you
broke your light, I've been pushing it for an hour.
hello justice ward, good to see you again. Yes, yes sir. Thank you mr. Bohannon, thank you mr.
cheshire, thank you mr. Ventrell.
thank you all for being willing to meet with me and to sit down and answer some questions.
and let me go ahead and thank you in advance for getting ready to come to my community so that you can
answer the questions that they have personally. So that we're not in this kind of
for you because this is personal for us because we live in sweet home.
we're not trying to leave sweet home. We're not trying to be pushed
out of sweet home. We love sweet home and riceville, so therefore this is
personal. So we don't have to have this big audience or anything. We want to sit
down and we want to ask you straightforward some questions so that it can ease the mind of some
of the people that are elderly, that don't have. Social media that don't get
to chat in on conversations or whatever, but I want them to be able
to come out and you all talk to them and speak to them face to face and answer their questions because this ain't no
game for us. This is like life or death for us.
so we want the questions answered and I thank you for being willing to do that
and I'm gonna get you a date and I'll be looking forward to seeing all three of y'all.
we'll be there or I'll be there.
justice davis. Hi, I think justice pearson and blackwood asked my question,
but there is no plan for where the discharge water for avo will go
at this point. Is that correct? Not that I know of.
okay, so when will that be established? When we through the water
contract with them. Okay, so there hasn't been any
ideas thrown around? Discharge water maybe where
that wastewater will be discharged. Not with me.
okay. I think that's the scariest part for me and my community is,
you know, where is that wastewater going to go?
and we still don't know. Okay.
I yield. Okay.
and I think, justice robinson, you were next.
thank you, thank you for being here.
so mr. Mccoy here did kind of ask you a little bit of my question, but an open
loop system versus a closed loop system. My understanding, it is a closed loop system.
so do you have any idea how much water that will actually save?
not a clue. And my engineers aren't here.
okay. So since we don't know,
I guess we'll go on to my second question then. My second question is
with contracts, say some industrial pig slaughtering
house came before you all, would you require a contract
with said facility before you gave them a... I mean, they got any kind
of improvement from city of little rock, city of north little rock, whoever.
would they have to have a contract with caw
before they would have that approval?
I'm trying to figure out where is the limit of requiring a contract?
is it a million gallons a day? Is it 10 million gallons a day? Before you got
to have a contract in place, is there some threshold? It is a matter
of every new commercial entity, there is a developer's contract
that comes about. This one is different because
of the amount of infrastructure that they are going to have
to put in to get the water there.
okay. I don't, I mean.
so the contract is two-fold then? It's got a, I guess an infrastructure.
portion along with a monetary portion? As I said before, when an
ordinary development comes to us, we say, here's the
infrastructure, and here's what it's going to cost,
and this is what you've got to put in. This one's just bigger.
so developer has a 500 lot subdivision that comes in and
you review the engineers plans on behalf of caw and say okay the only there's only a six
inch water line that feeds the subdivision needs to be a 10 inch and you got
to go seven miles this way to get to our 12 inch that's
in a contract with that developer. That is correct.
okay. Thank you, iu.
justice curry, I think you're next. Thank you all so much for being here today.
it's been a lot of great information shared.
as I sit here and we're dealing with, of course, the data center for pulaski
county, would there be... At any point because there's the other data center
at the port. So in splitting, I was just sitting here
thinking about the water supply.
of course, you're having to pipe from a different direction for the wrightsville, so would
it ever be a conflict with the one going in for the port as we backed up back
into the county part?
so the infrastructure for the
two data centers would tie on to this, our system
at two different places. Okay, I just wanted to make sure I understood on that part.
I don't know enough about this, but we're doing our best. You know, it's, since so many of you...
there's a 24-inch pipeline that runs down the pine bluff
highway that the port would tie onto,
and it needs additional use on it. We welcome additional use, and
in fact, it also brings more water to the port area for further
industrial development within the port, within the industrial park there.
the 145th street site. We'll have to go farther west
to university avenue or beyond, depending on where we go. So they'll be getting water
from two different places. Thank you. Thank you.
thank you. And justice medlock, not
matlock, no tv, you're next. Thank you.
hi again. Thank you. So.
I am just curious
about this contract. Who negotiates this contract, and how are these terms brought forth that are negotiated
with caw and avo? Who
negotiates that contract? Avo will send their reps, and I'll be the final word on,
well, I guess my commission will be the final word, but I would be the negotiator
on caw's side. And so do your... From what I'm understanding,
your negotiations include things that are advantageous
for not just you, but that you can pass along to your customers.
that is beneficial. That is the plan. Okay.
and at what stage is this contract usually negotiated
when a company comes to you, like a data center? Let's just say data center.
at what process do they negotiate a contract
with a water company? That's a great question.
and the response that I have. Given to it in the past whether
it's right or wrong is the response that I've been given is we're small potatoes
compared to the electrical contract okay I would think
that it's coming though at some point or well it'll have to they have to come to us
get a meter and I guess the only other thing I'm I'm
curious about these negotiations.
what are some of the negotiations you've negotiated with other companies that have
came to you that needed substantial infrastructure?
the negotiations on water.
in most instances, have to do with what infrastructure are they going to have to put in
to get the quantity of water that they need at their project.
that is the ordinary negotiation.
this is a, this, we will certainly negotiate that.
state law 605 says that. We are required to serve them provided that they agree
to pay for, we're required to serve a customer so long as they agree to pay
for the infrastructure required to serve the project.
so pipes, how far they have to go get it back, what their
connection fee was going to be. I mean, there's several
standard terms that kind of come under negotiation for water.
okay, that helps. Thank you. I hope so.
I yield. Justice blackwood, you're re-recognized.
grateful for you guys all speaking. It's really helpful to have
everybody come up here and speak tonight,
and I appreciate it a lot, and
to put up with all my questions. But you are the lobbyists and the utility companies, and what
I was wondering is... If we could have someone from
like wendell griffin come up and speak on the other aspects of this.
I don't think that's a question to me, or is it? Ms.
blackwood, we've got this panel set up. I was just wondering that.
I'm sorry? I was just wondering. You may want to schedule one
in the future. Okay. But this panel set it's obvious
that folks time is going to be spent and very appreciative of them and folks that have
shown up for this, but at some point we're gonna run out of time and we still have business to do mr. Bohannon,
thank you and appreciate your
your help and I'm sure that
many folks are like me. We don't know some
of the intricate details of how these things work. So you've been a great help.
thank you very much. Justice ward, I look forward to hearing from you.
anybody else want us to come talk to any of your constituents about this or anything else?
justice elliott, I'm happy to do so. Water makes the world go round.
you're going to get a call from the maumelle lions
club. Trust me. And as we tell prospects,
it's the best water in this side of glory, so we're going to keep it that way.
obviously, there's been a lot of conversations about water and electricity. I'm going to ask john bethel,
who was the longtime executive director of the arkansas public service commission, which can address some
of the things, obviously, from a regulatory perspective that
these projects have to go through. I want to reiterate, though, what I said the last time I met
with you folks, and that is... These projects aren't done.
we keep asking for things that still don't yet exist because
we're working through the process. Where should the water come
from? What should the size of those lines be and therefore what
will that cost be to create the contract? Obviously you folks have, or
many folks have purchased a home in their life. And you don't ever purchase
that home until you know what the cost is and how you're
going to pay for it. And so economic development projects are really no different, which is why...
we're not yet to the point where those contracts need
to be negotiated, but we're moving there in a
reasonable and an efficient manner with the regulatory aspect that this project,
amazon, trex, whatever project we want to talk about, they all go
through these same processes. Before a final decision is made from the company's perspective
about what they will or won't do. So to discuss a little bit more
the aspect of the arkansas public service commission, its regulatory authority,
former executive director of the psc and now director of public services for entergy, john bethel.
welcome, john. Thank you. Good evening, judge, members
of the court. Go ahead. I'm, as jay said, I'm john
bethel, director of public affairs for intergy arkansas.
and prior to joining intergy
eight years ago, I worked for the arkansas public service commission for almost 30 years and was the executive director of the agency for 18 of those
30 years. And so I can tell you a little
bit about how the regulatory structure is in place to govern public utilities.
such as energy under arkansas law the public service commission has exclusive jurisdiction to regulate public
utilities including a setting rates terms and conditions of service as well as approval
for construction love utility projects such as power plants and large transmission lines a
and that's part of the commission's authority the
commission regulates the rates charge to customers including any contracts. Between the utility and an individual customer.
as a part of regulating the rates, the commission ensures that costs are allocated
to each rate class in a way that reflects the cost of serving that class. The allocation
of costs is intended to ensure that each class of customers pays its cost of service.
for contracts, the commission was found that rates for the customer cover its costs and
provide benefits to other customers. The commission ensures that the
rates are just, reasonable, and non-discriminatory, and ensures that each class pays
its fair share of the cost of service. And the commission has a process
for reviewing contracts between
utilities and individual customers, and that process includes a
test to make sure that that contract does result in benefits for other customers, that it
covers its costs and provides benefits. The commission also oversees
utility resource planning to make sure that the utilities have adequate resources
to serve all of their customers at all times.
as mr. Thompson mentioned earlier, there's an integrated resource plan that the utility prepares
on a regular cycle that looks out into the future to make sure that we know that we're meeting the level
of demand that's there. And the public service commission relies on those studies in evaluating.
projects that come in to make sure that we have the resources necessary to meet the load and to provide for room for growth
and that we're doing it in a way that makes sure that rates are just and reasonable and are in the public interest.
for large customers such as data center customers, utilities must ensure that
there are adequate resources to serve those customers. And as mr. Thompson pointed out, entergy arkansas does that
with each one of those customers and the track record is there for making sure that
we have adequate power and making sure that we have
reliable power and that we have
affordable power and that's under the jurisdiction of the public service commission.
if we have to construct new power plants, transmission lines or substations to serve existing
customers or new customers, we have to seek approval from the public service commission.
the utility has to demonstrate that the facilities are
necessary and in the public interest. We also have to demonstrate that the cost
of the facility is reasonable before commencing construction and must demonstrate again that
the costs are reasonable as a part of recovering those costs through rates.
the public service commission oversees the construction and the approval beforehand, and they oversee the rates that are
charged to customers after the fact.
to make sure that the rates remain reasonable over the life
of the assets that are there. All commission filings and proceedings are open
to the public. There's a web page with access to information in each proceeding before the
public service commission. Hearings are open and available to the public. Hearings offer the opportunity
for public comment. The public service commission offers the opportunity for written public comment
throughout the pendency of a case that's in front of them.
customers can submit. Public comments online or in person.
so there's an adequate opportunity
for public participation in arkansas public service commission proceedings. The commission is charged with
protecting the public interest. The attorney general's office consumer utility rate advocacy division is
automatically a party to any case at the public service commission in which it wants
to participate. The attorney general's office has the role
of being the consumer advocate. For customers and rate payers in arkansas. They are the official state
advocate for customers by law. The office has a staff that actively participates
in proceedings to represent customers
with particular emphasis on residential customers. Also, other customer groups are
able to participate to petition the commission and participate as a party in regulatory proceedings
in front of the commission. Customers have the opportunity to have not only representative
from the public service commission staff in those proceedings, from the attorney general's
office, and then some customers participate either individually or as a group, particularly
commercial industrial customers
do that regularly. And I say all that to tell you and to give you an assurance that there is a
robust regulatory framework that has been in place for many, many years.
and. As mr. Thompson pointed out, arkansas has among the lowest rates
in the country, and so I think the public service commission process works effectively, and by law
is the entity that's established to have jurisdiction
over utility rates, resource planning, quality of service. All of that entire suite
of activities is covered there, and so I don't believe that a separate or additional process
to oversee utility operations is required, and I'll take questions.
justice robinson, you're recognized. Thank you. Thank you for being here.
so with the psc, we...
I guess we discuss arkansas quite a bit. I know entergy is in mississippi, they're in louisiana, and a little bit
in texas. So do those states have the same regulatory umbrella that
arkansas has? Very similar. One difference between in
mississippi and louisiana, the public service commissioners are elected, and in arkansas
they're appointed by the governor, and in texas they're appointed by the governor.
and they serve in arkansas specifically they are appointed to a six-year term and they're staggered so that every two
years a commissioner's term comes up and the governor can either reappoint the existing commissioner or appoint a new
commissioner into that place and the current commissioners two of them have been appointed
by governor sanders one was appointed by governor
hutchinson and over time depending on how long the governor serves, they may
appoint one, they may appoint two, they may appoint all three over the course of their term in office, and that's happened
for as long as the public service commission's been around.
would you say that arkansas is, I mean, we talk about the contracts and we talk
about all the overseeing of this infrastructure.
is arkansas one of the leaders? From the other states? Are we mid-tier?
where are we at? I think in the regulatory construct,
we're comparable with... Other states in the region and
we're comparable with many states nationally as far as having a public service commission that's either
appointed or elected. And in a rates standpoint and a quality of service standpoint,
I think arkansas and the southeastern united states have a lot of advantages over other parts of the country
because our rates are affordable and our power is. Reliable. And you'll see if you look
nationally, the southeastern united states has
among the lowest rates in the country. And I think you'll also see
that states that have a
vertically integrated regulated public utility model in place, such as we have in arkansas, have more competitive
electric rates than states that have introduced some form
of competition or choice. Within the utility space,
I think the statistics will bear out that that's another advantage that the southeastern united states have from a
regulatory construct versus some other parts of the country. So would you say that having
lower rates, does our infrastructure age more than the ones that have higher
rates, or is our infrastructure capacity and abilities where it needs to be.
I think that our infrastructure is sound.
I think there is always room for improvement and I think part of our next generation
arkansas plan here in arkansas is to continue to make investments
in our system to make it more reliable and you're seeing that
and you've been seeing that over the last several years that we have been investing
in our generation assets, our transmission assets, and our distribution assets.
to make the system more reliable, and we've been able to do that while keeping rates well below the national average
and while keeping the increase in rates well below or below the rate of inflation
for a real long time. And so I think that you're seeing, I think,
effective utility behavior and within the effective regulatory model that's in place here in
arkansas. Thank you. I yield.
hi, thank you for being here. You're welcome.
so my question, I'm trying to piece this together.
you regulate the companies that provide service to these companies coming in or asking for the service,
like the dallas center. The public service commission does, and I once upon a time was the director of the
public service commission. I am currently an entergy employee,
just so you're clear. But I was speaking on
describing the regulatory construct in arkansas. And, yes, you are correct. The public service commission
regulates utilities such as entergy here in arkansas. So I assume that the public
service commission has had conversations with avo? I'm not certain that I can
address that. There is a gentleman here tonight from avio that can talk about their interaction
with the public service commission. But the public service
commission has a proceeding open now where we have entered into a contract with avio and we're seeking public service
commission approval of that contract. So you're seeking approval
of the contract,
but there is a contract in place. Yes.
and it's got to go through all the regulation. It has to be approved
by the public service. With the public service. Yes, ma'am. And that's real similar
to the google data center in west memphis. We had a contract with them.
we took it to the public service commission for approval, and the public service commission
has approved that contract and found that it was in the public interest and provided benefits to customers in arkansas.
so to kind of piggyback on... Justice robinson's question,
where are we with those regulations? Would you say we have strict
regulations in place with the surrounding areas? On that tier,
he was... I think arkansas's regulatory
construct is viewed favorably nationally. I mean, when I was with the public service commission, the
commission had a reputation of being...
a good and a fair regulatory body relative to some places in the country.
some places were less so than others.
but I think that arkansas has a strong public service commission that represents the state's interest.
okay. Thank you. I yield.
he didn't say anything.
ms. Blackwood, you're recognized.
it's groundhog day. It's okay. It's all right. Thank you for being here today.
we do appreciate you showing up. What I want to know is the pfc,
what land use impacts and regulations does the pfc oversee?
the public service commission does not govern land use. That's usually a city
government or a county government function as far as that goes.
that's outside of their jurisdiction.
that's exactly what I thought. So you have no control over the land impacts or the regulation
or any of that and what's going to happen.
the public service commission would not, but over the other regulatory spaces. If the county has regulations
over the land use, those would apply. If the city, within the city,
or, and then the environmental
regulations would be overseen by the department of environmental quality and the
corps of engineers, as well as water and air permits would go under those agencies' purview. Which, you know, okay.
and so consequently, we don't know what the impacts are going to be.
on our land use and we have no idea what's going to happen to our infrastructure so if we
don't have some kind of moratorium set up and we don't sit down and go over this to
make sure that our land use quality is good and that everything goes okay there their psc has no regulations
over any of this and you guys don't either so um I would disagree with you
on that because you pointed out or you stated that there's no knowledge of what the utility
infrastructure would be. From the electric utility infrastructure, you've heard
from my colleague and you've heard from me that the electric infrastructure is sound and
able to take on this and other projects and keep rates low and competitive.
you've heard from mr. Bohannon that the water utility is prepared to take
on this and other customers. So you have... You have information from the
people that are involved in those services to speak directly to that.
so I would disagree with you on that, and I can speak specifically to the entergy utility
infrastructure to say that we do have the ability to serve this customer as well as our other customers and to do it in
a way that keeps rates competitive and ensures that under the fair share plus
pledge that that customer is going to pay its cost of service and bring benefits
to our other customers. But once again, this is a pledge.
actually, it's a contract, as mr. Thompson pointed out, and as I
just answered justice medlock, that we have a contract with this customer that includes those provisions.
but you will never, ever. The fair share plus pledge is also published,
and it has been supported by our ceo and our company
president. That's what scares me.
so if we, if we, and you tell us we have low rates in our, in our state.
well we have, we are one of the poorest states
in the nation. We are 45th to 49th every year. We are, the medium income
in our state is around $60,000 or lower.
the reason our rates are low is because our people can't afford anything else. So they do have to keep,
it's kind of like, you know, when you live in california or you live in new york, you've got some higher rates and people make a lot more money.
here we've got very, very poor people, and we've got a lot of them.
and we have the greatest food insecurity, and we are a poor state.
so the reason we have low rates is because you probably can't get any more money out
of people. That's incorrect, at least from the electric utility standpoint.
we have low rates because of our long-term planning and our efficient operations of the system that have kept our rates
lower than they are in other parts of the country.
the rates aren't set based on the income of the customers in the area.
they're based on the cost of
serving the customers and the facilities that we build and the way that we operate those. And so your premise,
as you teed that up, I would respectfully disagree, and I would point out that, as mr.
thompson pointed out, our rates are low in arkansas because of decisions that were made a long time ago,
decisions that are made today, and decisions that are going to continue to be made to keep our rates competitive
regionally, nationally. And the arkansas general
assembly also recently passed legislation that requires that we keep our rates at least 10%
below the national average. We're currently 22% below the national average. So I anticipate that we'll be
able to meet that challenge. Right, and I'm glad they are because our people can't afford
anything any more than that. So I'm glad they are lower than they are in other states. But respectively, I mean, once
again,
I've never had anybody that's a monopoly, and that's what you are.
you are a monopoly. And we have nobody else to go to.
we have nobody else to choose. We have nobody else
to pick from. And you are a public utility, but you are a monopoly,
and it's a... It, it, you guys do not have
any kind of land use regulation. You guys do not have, you
basically can do whatever you want and you answer, you know, your salaries are outrageous.
I just, I am extremely scared of what is going to happen to us if we have this and we do
not have any kind
of regulations put on this. And we do not have any kind of, you know, it's very scary
for all of us. You know, because we aren't you. We are poor,
and we don't have a lot of money. I mean, you know, people may think the people up here make a
lot of money, but they don't. It's almost an act of love up here.
so, you know, I do say that this is a very scary thing
for people, and I, you know, do not understand how your
promises, I've just never had. Anybody that promised me, any
corporation that has promised me something come through. Well, you mentioned earlier
that we are a monopoly. We are. Under arkansas law, we are a
regulated monopoly. We're fully regulated, and that's what I was talking about previously.
the public service commission approves and sets a lot of our rates and makes sure that our rates are just and reasonable
and in the public interest. And, as I pointed out in response to justice medlock's question, states that
have a vertically integrated and fully regulated utility model, as we do here in arkansas, have lower rates than
states that don't. And statistics will prove that out. That's a fact.
and so I think that I can feel comfortable in telling you that we can serve these customers
and that we will continue to have competitive rates here
in arkansas. And that we can't do whatever we want because we have to go
to the public service commission and get approval
to build facilities. We have to go to the public service commission and get
approval for contracts. We have to go to the public service commission to adjust our rates.
and so your characterization is incorrect. We are overseen by the public
service commission, and we don't get to do whatever we want. And we don't do whatever we
want. We do what's in the interest of our customers.
help provide low cost, reliable service that's affordable for our customers.
well, my bill runs over $550 a month, and I have a 2,500 square foot home.
so I'm going to tell you, I don't know if that's low cost. And I also want to tell you that what does the
public service commission, what
are their obligations? I mean, you say you follow all their rules, but what are their obligations
to us as customers? Their obligations are to ensure that the rates are just and
reasonable and in the public interest and are as low as
reasonably possible
within the confines of the legal system that's been put in place by the arkansas
general assembly and the arkansas and federal court system. Okay.
okay, I yield. Mrs.
medlock, you're recognized. Thank you. So that kind of brought up
another question in my mind. Does the public service
commission work with the adeq?
they rely on the adeq for jurisdiction over things that the adeq has
responsibility for. If we're building a power plant, they... Seek input and make sure that
the adeq has issued all of the environmental regulations that would be necessary
for that power plant to operate in compliance with the federal and state
environmental regulations, such as air permits, water discharge permits,
and other things. Those are all regulated either by the epa directly for the federal government or the adeq
as delegated by the epa. And so the two agencies... Make sure that both are doing what they're supposed
to be doing. And that's part of the resource approval process is
confirmation that the utility, if we're going to build a power plant,
then we would have received all of the necessary environmental permits to build and operate
that plant. Thank you. And what's the website that people can go to?
I think it's arkansas.gov slash psc would be the public
service commission website. And if that's incorrect, you can google arkansas
public service commission. Thank you. I yield.
and that would go through a data center.
yes. Will, can you tell me, we have an address noise. And so will the backup
generators create noise? And how much noise and how much emission are these backup
generators going to be creating? The noise is not something I have knowledge of, or the
backup generators will be customer provided. And there's a gentleman here
from avio that could probably talk about what their backup generators are, but I can't
address their backup generators. Okay.
will the concentration of electrical demand alter future land patterns?
I can't predict how it might alter future land patterns.
okay. It may help spur economic development if you have a large
economic development project that employs people at competitive salaries,
then that could lead to good growth and development jobs for arkansans.
but aren't ai centers supposed to get rid of jobs? Actually, they employ a lot of
people and pay them a pretty competitive salary.
based on what the customers have said, and again, there's a gentleman here from
avio that can talk about what their employment efforts are going to be.
okay. Can you tell me whether the
emergency services are capable of handling battery or transformer fires?
I can't speak to the emergency services capabilities.
I can point out that there are occasionally transformer fires that have happened
for many years, and those are managed. Very effectively by our
personnel in cooperation with the local emergency management folks.
so I would assume that that will continue to be the case.
that's not a new issue. Okay. My main question, and I'm sure you can't answer this either,
what happens to the community and the landscape because of this infrastructure exists?
what happens to our community and our landscape because
of this? I mean, you know, what is the impact to our land
and our landscape? I'm sure you can't answer that. I don't have the answer
to that. Yeah, you probably couldn't answer that.
okay, I yield.
so after talking
about the regulatory aspects, the electric, the water, the wastewater and all these issues
that need to be answered, we actually have a gentleman from avaya
with us today. I'm going to bring him forward. His name is tom nessel.
so that you can actually ask him questions. I will say, and it was
mentioned, and I just want to clarify, I'm here as the
president and ceo of the little rock regional chamber of commerce.
we have contracts for economic development with people like little rock,
maumelle, north little rock, and many others. And so I'm not here doing
anything other than what I have been hired to do. And it is this low-cost
electricity, this redundancy and availability, this capacity that continues to
help us locate projects that are paying or that have good-paying jobs that help
increase the wages of all arkansans. Because that rising boat does
lift all tides if we don't have economic development. And you can look at a lot
of places across this country that unfortunately don't have that going for themselves. You see what decay begins
to look like, not growth.
so with that, tom.
justices of the peace of the quorum court, judge hyde, thanks
for having me this evening. Members of the community, thanks for coming out. I'm here.
I'm a project manager for avio, and I'd like to just walk through some things that we've done
on this project to date. We're here. We want to be good neighbors.
we're here to listen. I just want to mention that
nothing we've done has been to hide the project from the world.
what's been done is pushing this project forward within the regulations as we understood
them. If you'll allow me, I just wanted to go through some
points and then answer your questions. And I'm probably not going
to be able to answer them all tonight. So anyway, thank you for your patience.
and if you have follow-up questions, if I can't answer something tonight,
I can direct your questions to somebody at our company who can.
first off, I want to start with land use.
as we understood it coming into this property on 145th street, there was no zoning
regulations in the county. Now, recently a future land use plan was adopted.
that future land use plan actually highlights our project's area as I-1, which specifically calls out
data centers as a land use. So as far as the information that I have and the county's
future land use plan, we are compliant with that. Secondly, I want to talk
about our interactions
with the county so far. We do have a site plan that was submitted to the county
planning department first in 2024 near the end. We met with the county planning
office in the summer of 2024 to discuss the data center project that we were putting forward.
that site plan, which showed the buildings on our site.
that were data centers was reviewed and according to the
subdivision and development regulations of the county it
complied and there are a few permits that we've gotten along the way so in order to start construction we had
to get a driveway permit from pulaski county road and bridge that's been acquired and
to answer maybe some of the environmental questions our
stormwater pollution and prevention plan was approved
by the arkansas deq. So that regulates, hey, what
are you using this land for? Where are you grading?
how does that grading affect the water flow on the site? Your plan has to basically put in any mitigation measures
to any impacts, and that's regulated by the deq,
and that's been approved. The last thing we have is
what's called a nationwide permit. From the army corps of
engineers, we've been working with them. That permit was submitted six months ago.
that required us to do basically environmental studies of the property, including
historical and cultural studies, as well as rare species studies.
those have been complete. And I want to point out our wetland impact, which
are the more environmentally sensitive areas on the site, is three culverted stream
crossings. Right so basically less than a tenth
of an acre impact we're going over the streams we've specifically designed our site
plan to minimize the impacts to the wetlands wetland areas on our property um so just just
wanted to point out we've been through those those studies and
and had those touch points um power's been covered pretty extensively but we do have an
executed electric services agreement with entergy. We first started talking to
entergy in early 24.
and basically, the way our process has worked to date is starting in 2024,
they studied the grid. And when they studied the grid, as they mentioned, they looked
for contingent impacts. So not just what's my impact to the grid?
can they serve it? Are the electrons there? What infrastructure is needed
but what happens if something upstream happens or if something downstream happens? How does it affect the grid? And so avaya funded those
studies, and there were basically two sets, and then we began the electric services agreement.
that electric service agreement requires us to pay for all interconnection costs
associated with the project. So it's executed,
and that money has started to go out the door. And I wanted to just...
make it clear the only reason entergy executed that agreement was because they did do the
studies and they determined that they could serve the project without negatively
impacting the grid and with us footing the bill for any infrastructure upgrades.
as previously mentioned, that is regulated by the arkansas public service
commission commission water. You've heard a lot about water tonight.
we've again first started talking to central arkansas water in 2024.
we had them look at what infrastructure is
in place currently at the site. And anyway, we've been talking
about it. They've determined and provided us a letter that the existing
infrastructure can serve one million gallons a day to the project.
that would be enough to serve the project's needs as we know them and more so.
and I'll get into the water use a little bit more. But I just want to communicate that we've gone
through that process with central arkansas water. We weren't hiding anything.
we were trying to communicate clearly and openly. And anyway, so they've provided that we'll serve.
for 1 million gallons a day based on the existing infrastructure.
so one of the things that mr. Boyan brought up was connecting
to the west and 4 million gallons a day. So this project and some of the
numbers I can share are specific to basically right now we have a plan
for the first two buildings. We have a contract executed
with navholz and yates construction to go forward and construct those first two
buildings. And that million gallons a day is more than sufficient
to supply the cooling needs for those first two buildings.
we have designed a closed-loop system,
and there's been some questions on that. So the closed-loop system is where you have air conditioners in a yard.
those air conditioners, just like at your home, chill water. That water gets piped
into the building, and then we have air handlers blow air. Over that chilled water to cool the building.
in an evaporative cooling situation, which was sort of also mentioned,
there are two loops. That closed loop cooling that exists in the building,
where again nothing evaporates, but that heat gets rejected by piping
by a separate loop. And that loop pipes separate
chilled water to the roof or to wherever and basically that chiller sucks cold their fruit
sucks fresh air through a media and cools the building. Basically, it cools that water
loop that cools the building. So in that evaporative cooling situation, that's where the
million gallons a day at the absolute peak day would be used.
the average demand on a daily basis would be about 200,000 gallons a day. And in the wintertime, it basically doesn't run.
so order of magnitude different. What avio has designed is the
closed loop. Cooling for the first two buildings.
so instead of the million gallons a day, we're talking about 20,000
to use round numbers. So those 20,000 gallons a day,
it's basically for plumbing needs and irrigation needs.
so that gets discharged into the sanitary sewer system. That sanitary sewer system goes to 145th street sewer district.
we have hired 145th street sewer district's engineer. They tell us that that
wastewater treatment plant has more than the capacity needed to serve our sanitary sewer
needs. Now, if we get an end user that
comes along and requires an evaporative cooling system
for that million gallons a day, that's what the willserve allows us to do.
that water would require basically treatment and discharge.
via the arkansas deq, they have a discharge permit process,
and that discharge water has to meet certain quality standards.
so when we're talking about 20,000 gallons a day
for the site, again, for the first two buildings we're talking about here, that's
about 50 homes or 11 acres of cornfields worth of water in a year, approximately.
a couple other points. So noise.
we have designed the buildings to minimize noise impacts. The cooling system runs
whenever it's cold enough to run,
or whenever it's warm enough to run, which is frequently. And the air conditioners
produce noise. Those air conditioners will be
placed in a yard, and they will be surrounded by a physical buffer.
we have selected for our design low ambient fans on those chillers
to keep the noise levels down. Second noise emission would be our emergency backup
generators. So they only run in large groups when the power goes out.
those generators are enclosed in the building and they're muffled.
avaya's buildings, as our
approved site plan shows, the closest residential property line is 800 feet
from that building. We will maintain the existing vegetated buffer between that
building and that property line.
we did a noise study based on our plan and even if the backup generator generators are
running the noise level at all of our property lines will be under 55 decibels which is a
conversation and if it's just the air conditioners for all intents and purposes you won't
be able to hear it if you're not on the property.
those setbacks also allow us not to be seen so you won't be able
to see these buildings from the street. And just a note
on fire protection. So we have engineered fire protection systems in the building. There's significant mechanical
and electrical infrastructure to power the computers. And the fire suppression system
will meet national fire protection agency standards.
and insurance requirements also, they will also comply with the most stringent
insurance company's requirements for fire suppression systems. I also want to note
about outreach. So we are committed to being a good neighbor.
again, we reviewed the project with the county planning department in mid-2024.
we did reach out to our state rep and our state senator in the spring of 25.
we did issue a press release about the project in early 2026.
and I want to note that in order to get the project... Far enough along
to make it worth conversations with the public. There's a lot
of work streams that have to happen to make it real. We don't want to waste people's
time if we don't think the project's viable, and so we have to do a lot
of diligence and a lot of work to get the project to a place where we're comfortable making a press announcement
about it. After the press release,
we did meet with our state rep and a mayor of a local municipality
after that. And we are setting up a community advisory group
to regularly communicate about the project. So I'd like
to just wrap that up. We're committed to being a good neighbor. We're here.
we have received county approvals for the project. We have received permits
necessary to start construction. Entergy has studied the grid, determined it can serve the
project, and we have executed the electric service agreement. And we are required to fund all
interconnection costs. Central arkansas water has studied its infrastructure and
capacity and determined that it can reliably serve the project. 145th street sewer district's
engineer has also studied the system and determined it can reliably serve the project.
so that brings me
to a conclusion of the work streams we've been operating
on the project, and again, we've been trying to be... We've been following the regulations that exist and
going through the approval processes as we understood
them. So thank you. Thank you
for your questions.
thank you. Justice davis, I think you were first.
did the kinder morgan pipeline, did that play a role
in picking that spot for the data center? Yes.
we viewed it as a potential future development for the project.
if we could find a partner that would be interested in developing some other type of generation,
that gas line could be useful since it's already in place and on site.
if we can find somebody interested
in developing it that way. Okay. I think that's the part that is the scariest part because
everyone's focused on energy, which is... Fine, but it's the noise from the generators and
from the natural gas. How far is daisy bates from the data center?
I don't know what daisy bates is. I believe it's the school. Oh, the elementary school?
it's about two miles. Okay, two miles. So I'm worried
about those kids outside playing with just the humming.
can we get a copy of the noise study? I can I'm not sure what the
best avenue to do that is, but we can definitely share the noise study information. Yes.
and I'd like to point out that our our closest neighbor is a
steel galvanizing facility between and that exists between us in the school.
there are other other uses of property between us and in
our neighboring area that are heavy industrial that could also, you know, it's also next
to the highway. So. There are other noise generating uses in the area,
but I'm not taking your question lightly. I understand what you're saying, and we can absolutely
share the noise study conclusions. Yes. Yes, I'm not trying to paint
you guys as the boogeyman. I just, as our roles are to do our due diligence to serve our community.
so that is all. And then the wastewater. So at first it will. Taking care of,
but then it can later on be taken care of on site.
is that correct? Is that what you said?
what I said was the sanitary sewer needs, so from the
plumbing fixtures basically, that can be handled by 145th
street sewer. So that is where that is going. If there is a client that
demands evaporative cooling, that will mean that some of that million gallons a day
needs to be discharged. That cannot go to the wastewater treatment plant.
that will be treated on-site and discharged. Where will it be discharged?
it will be discharged on-site in accordance with a permit from the deq. So we'll have to treat it
to the deq standards in order to discharge it on-site. Okay, and my last question is,
will the natural gas only be used for backup power?
no. I'll say there's no, we don't have approval
to use the gas now at all. So that would be a future
development. Thank you.
I yield.
justice ward. Thanks for being here.
question. When you're looking for sites, what are some
of the things that you... Have on your checklist? Yeah, one is,
I guess the first one is, does this, can we have basically minimal impact environmentally
on the site? Can we completely avoid wetlands?
what's the topography of the site? The second is power.
can we talk to the utility to see if there is a substantial amount of power that's on the grid now?
that's not being utilized that we can go into. We don't specialize in going
into places that need a lot of power infrastructure to be built to serve the project.
then we also look at water. What's the water source? Is it groundwater?
is it surface water? Is it recycled water? Here, the municipality serves
water from surface water, which means we don't have to go
into the ground aquifers. So those are probably the initial highlights.
and then we look at, okay, what's the land use regulations
that are in place now? Are data centers allowed use or are they not?
and what would it take to have them be in allowed use?
okay. My next question. Have you ever picked a location
but because of the community concerns you backed out
of it?
so far, no. So far we've been able, I should say, so far we've been able to work
with communities to get them supportive of the projects.
okay, next question. Could you educate us on the purpose
of this data center? What's the purpose of it? So we are, I'll just point out,
we're a developer and we will lease space in this building to a larger scale user.
so I'm not google. I'm not meta. I'm not amazon web services.
but hopefully a company such as that will be a tenant in the data center.
so it will it will they will provide, you know,
those will be the end users of the buildings. They will install the computing
equipment and what they typically use it for,
such as aws. Just don't you know, I'm not an aws person, but
in general, we all use them every day. Right now we're in a meeting
that's being recorded and broadcast. I have documents that I'm
reading to you. You guys have documents on here.
all of that stuff has to live on the cloud. That cloud is a physical space. Some
of us use ai operations. Some of us use google search and use the ai function.
that all passes through data centers. Same thing. And a bit on why there's backup generators in the first place is these are viewed as
mission-critical facilities so that when you go make a transaction on...
on your debit card to buy gas or if your doctor needs to pull up your medical records,
to use a couple examples, those can't be down. My computer can't be off.
it has to be on. And so that's why we install backup generators
at the facilities. But to your point, we all use them every day.
okay.
so this data center wouldn't primarily serve arkansas. It could serve any state. You know, the jobs
on the facility, the tax revenue generated by the facility would serve the
local area.
but in terms of the specific use cases, typically they, you know, there's a latency effect.
so the farther you are away physically from a data center, the longer it takes
to transmit. So typically these companies like to serve the needs as close to
the data center as they can. But, yeah, they can serve nationally. Absolutely.
okay, thank you for not making me feel dumb about it. And I want to invite you to the
community meeting as well. Okay. Justice robinson, I think you
were next.
thank you. Thank you for being here. So I have heard, I guess, that the building may be a leed
certified building. Is that correct? Yes, we design all of our buildings to leed
silverstone. Leed silver standards. Okay. And can, for, I guess,
if people don't know what that means, can you please explain what the leed is?
yeah, it's an official certification process where basically you, it's meant to be a third party where I design my
facility to be, to meet certain power efficiency requirements. How well insulated is my
building so that it doesn't leak heat in the wintertime or leak air conditioning in the summertime.
so basically, the more efficient you design the building, you're eligible
for a leed accreditation. Okay. And I just, I mean, leed,
for those that don't know, is leadership in energy and
efficiency.
and it is a u.s. Global accreditation?
yes. But that is what you all I mean that is what yeah, and to talk
about a few more points, like we're paying attention and we're trying to be as efficient
as possible. Obviously the power demand of the facility is very large, but the way we've planned it,
we've put solar panels on the roof to offset the power demands
of the administration part of the building. So the part where everybody is
going to work, not where the computers are, that has to be lit, air-conditioned, et cetera.
and so. Our intent is for, we've designed the facility such that
the solar on site can provide the power to the administration portion
of the building. We're also doing things like capturing the rainwater.
so, you know, when it rains, we want to use that water. We're sending it to a tank,
and then we're using that for our irrigation system to cut down on the water numbers I shared earlier.
and we're also, we have a consultant on board who's going
to install, for example, beehives on the site to enhance the pollinators and hopefully
make some honey out of it. But anyway, we're paying attention to environmental concerns and
we're trying to be as efficient as we can be. Do you know if, have you all received that certification yet
or is it still in the application phase? No, we don't get that
certification until the construction is complete. Okay.
thank you, a.u. Justice pearson, I think you're
next. Thank you for being here. Can you make your adeq report public and put it
on your website? The stormwater pollution and prevention plan?
whatever adeq gave you. There, y'all went through a completed test.
I think it is public. I haven't checked their website,
but it's probably. I can, yes. Okay, cool.
end users. You brought up end users. And you brought up some
examples, aws, google. Will they make a contract with you or will they have
to talk to these stakeholders that. Came before today as well?
they will make a contract with me, and they will most likely step
into my contract with entergy, most likely. Or they'll go through us.
it's just kind of a contracting mechanism at that point. Okay.
do you have built into your contract any leeway if company x want to come in and they ask
for more power or more resources than you may have thought of, that you may have
perceived? No, we can only contract for the power that we have signed
an agreement for. Got it.
with your agreement with? Entergy. Got it. All right.
so what happens if avios... Scales down or closes doors.
do you have something in your contract, your current contract,
that dictates who was on the hook for that if that happens?
more or less, yes. Basically, tenants will be
required to pay rent, and if they cancel, there's cancellation terms that will
require them to foot certain costs. So if you close, if 80, if a vaio says, hey, we're not,
business is not booming,
we're closing our doors, then you're on the hook or your vendor, your end user is on the hook?
they would be the ones dictating to close the doors. We would never close the doors
if they were using the facility. And we would only close if they
dictated to us to close. Are you? Justice blackwood, you're
recognized. Okay, so you're a privately
owned company, and I wonder why you do not list your investors. Certain investors, I think, prefer to...
I'm not a financial guy, so I'll caveat that with what you will,
but certain investors don't
like to be disclosed. Right, so you do not disclose
your investors, which is a little bit scary. And you're not, you know,
you are saying that you will pay for everything and
everything's going to be on you and you're not going to make us pay for anything.
but are you getting tax incentives? Again, not an expert
on the financials, but the project may be eligible for state tax incentives or
local tax incentives if we meet certain employment requirements.
and certain investment requirements.
and so if we do, we plan to pursue them, yes.
okay. Have you talked to anybody about tax incentives yet? I believe we have, yes. Okay.
what about sales tax exemptions?
I believe we have talked to the arkansas edc about that. Yeah.
so you've hit that too. What about expediting your permitting procedures?
not to my knowledge, no. Okay.
and what about any of the utility agreements with entergy?
have you made special utility agreements with entergy? Not to my knowledge, no.
okay. So you're going to pay full price to entergy
for whatever you're doing? As far as I'm aware. Okay.
so it looks like... And I'll just say a note on the tax. I believe the quick math that
we've done is even if we got the maximum incentives, right, the first two buildings alone
on a property tax basis for avio's improvements would be about $6.7 million a year.
and then with our tenants, that would be about $10.5 million a year.
and that's if the incentives were captured. Right, right.
it looks like... 80% of that going to the school district,
about. It looks like, you know, you could actually,
it says you could go into a $6 billion phase. You know, you could go as much as that at some point.
yes, there's definitely significant future development opportunity.
right, that's what I was thinking. So why do you, and what is your reason then for picking
arkansas? If you're not going to, if you don't know if you're going to get tax incentives, if you
don't know if you're going to get any kind of benefits, what's your reasoning
for picking arkansas? I think it would go back to. My initial site selection
criteria that I talked with justice ward about. Generally speaking,
the site is developable with minimal impacts to the environment.
there's power on the grid without exorbitant infrastructure needed
to serve it. There's water in the lines. And the land use, at least as
it's written right now, is compliant for data centers.
so it doesn't have to do with any kind of money that's being involved at all. It just is that you like arkansas and it looks like a good place and you've got some
water. The, I mean, the, well, little rock chamber, right,
has been very supportive. They brought us in, showed us that, sorry,
a little distracted by the noise for a second. But generally speaking, the reason we got here is because
of the. The things that I've listed. If we can capture some incentives, that would be a
bonus, certainly. Right, because there are a lot of them being put in the south.
there's a ton of data centers being set up in the south. And what
about light pollution? Yeah, our facilities are dark sky compliant, so it's a national standard.
it basically minimizes our lighting and directs all light downward so that it helps
minimize the light pollution. Can you give us... An analysis on that so that we know what the light pollution
will be? Yeah, I believe our lighting plan is part of the site plan submission,
and we can share that. Okay, thank you. Also, what
about the sewer rates? You said you're going
to do the 145 street sewer. Will they go up?
will our sewer rates go up? Or are they locked in that you're going to pay for everything and we will
definitely never, and you have a contract saying that legally, we will never have to pay any higher sewer rates.
I don't, I mean, I don't have a contract. I'll never get, no utility is
ever going to get a contract that says legally I'll never be able, they'll never be able to lift rates.
but generally speaking, what I know as the project manager is there's an existing sewer line on the site that goes, you
know, that the half mile or so to the wastewater treatment facility.
and there's no infrastructure upgrades that are required to serve the project. Okay.
thank you. Justice capps, I think you're
next. Thank you for being here. We appreciate your time.
you mentioned two buildings in the initial phase. What is the full capacity
of the project, building-wise?
across the 760 acres, there could be 15 buildings, approximately.
you also talked about an end user that requires evaporative. Cooling can you describe that a
little bit more please for an example yeah I mean just a just a recap right right right now
our base system is air cooled and that's what we're working
with several potential end users on if somebody does require evaporative cooling
that that goes back to the other system I can't speak to what customers right what might
require which system so I don't know if I'm answering your
question, if you could steer me a little bit. So is it computer or data center dependent,
like depending on what kind of technology they're using, what kind
of cooling they require? No, it's really just whether they want to be more power
efficient or want to be more water efficient. And they would have set that
standard for their company prior to talking to me.
so they would prefer to keep as they have for their other buildings,
let's say. Okay. And is there any type
of decommission plan for the project? I'm concerned that it's so
vast. And if the world changes and we no longer need these data
centers, you know, we used to have huge computers and now they're in our hands.
if the world changes, is there anything in place to decommission it
for environmental, community, things like that? Yeah, so. We've been focused
on commissioning, but generally speaking, right
now, we have the power contract with entergy for a certain amount of power that lights those first two
buildings. And so there's a lot of work that will have to go
into growing the site, and that will only happen if it's commercially viable. So if there's a tenant that
takes the first two buildings and might want more, then we would go through all
the processes we've talked about. Like tad mentioned on the
waterfront, if we want more water than the first two buildings, we have to connect further west and pay
for that infrastructure upgrade. If we want more power from energy, we have to pay for
those infrastructure upgrades. And so there's a lot of work that will go into building those 15
buildings that were not there yet. And so that's...
that's what we're focused on and the only reason more buildings would be added to the
site is if it's commercially viable in the long run.
our leases would be
on the order of 20 years. So we're talking about
relatively long term business deals to make these projects viable. Is decommissioning something
your company ever plans for? So right now in the industry, the demand is very high, and so
decommissioning has not been a focus, but something we're certainly willing to entertain to talk about, especially with
the community advisory board we're setting up. We don't have those plans quite
ready, but it's something we can develop over time. Thank you. Okay, thank you.
hi, thank you for being here and answering questions. So I have a variety of questions, so just bear
with me. Okay. Can you paint a picture
of this property, how many acres,
and what that looks like? Yes, basically think of it as two swaths, really.
one is kind of two hands, right? One is up here.
it's adjacent to interstate 530. And one is down here, and it
connects to 145th street. And it's kind of what's running between them
is the pipeline we were talking
about for spatial relations. So this is about 300 acres, and this is the remaining of the 760 up here.
okay. So 760 acres. And is it wooded? There's a pine tree forest
on the property? It's wooded. There's pine trees.
it's been... Historically used as timber harvesting operations. So some of it's hardwood, some
of it's pine stands. And you'd mentioned a barrier. Are you referring
to the trees? Yes. So how many acres are going to remain wooded
with timber?
I'm just trying to do the math in my head. So we have basically 300 acres
on the lower hand. We'll be disturbing about 70
acres of that and some of that we'll be replanting the trees
on. So about 100. So 70 acres for the buildings and the rest trees?
basically, yes. The rest of the three? 300. 300. Okay.
that's a lot of trees. Similar proportion will be on the northern part of the site. Okay.
and I mean, of course, you know, trees do recreate the air.
work as a noise buffer.
and with that being said, and you may not know the answer
to this, was this, do you know what this property was intended
for to be used as
before you purchased it? Like I said, I mean, based on
the historical studies we've had, a long time ago it was agricultural and then I can't I
can't remember exactly the duration, but it switched
to timber harvesting, and it's largely used
for hunting. Okay. And it sounds
like you have gone through a lot of studies and regulations thus far
to date. Yes. With the adeq.
with the adeq. Or the deq. I'm sorry.
yeah, adq, arkansas adq. Yeah, yeah. Yep. The leed certified program that
you were talking about, is that a more, I mean, it's
obviously a more extensive study regulated type program that you get certified,
certification for? I guess I'm asking, what does that look like as far
as additional regulations? And is there a cost to that? Yeah, so there's a cost
to that. In our engineering team,
we have leed-certified engineers,
and so they vet the design to make sure it's compliant with the design standards.
on our construction management team, we will have leed-accredited personnel.
they'll review and make sure, as constructed, it meets the leed requirements.
and then we'll be subject to special inspection to get the final accreditation.
and we'll, we have to obviously pay for those things. Okay.
I like the thing about the bees.
tell me a little bit more about that. I didn't, that's the first I'd heard about this. Yeah, we've heard a consultant.
he's got a phd in bees and I can introduce him to you.
he'd probably speak a lot better about it to me. Um basically, we're bringing a
hive on site shortly and establishing a few hives, and
they'll help pollinate the area in general. That's interesting.
and the solar panels are just for the administrative part
of the building? Basically, the math is all of the solar panels on the roof
will power the administrative portion of the building, yes.
so the solar panels are only going to be on the roof? That's the plan. If a tenant required it, we
would consider putting solar panels on the ground if it helped their cause, but right now the plan is
on the roof, yes. Okay. All right. Let me make sure I have all my
questions.
I'm assuming you probably picked arkansas because you found 760 acres. Also, we we started off with
about the 300 and then grew it because we did like what we were working
with both on the, you know, like I said, on the environmental,
on the power and on the waterfronts and then on the land use front.
so we we started with 300 and we grew. So here's another question.
how many projects do you actually have in place across the nation and how successful
are they and how big are they? I'm, my knowledge is probably adept
to this and maybe one other of our projects, but we have four projects moving forward
across the u.s. Of similar size to this one. Where are they at?
california, mississippi, and virginia. How many acres are they on?
100 to 650.
okay. Just curious. I believe that's all my
questions. Thank you.
I yield. Justice blackwood, I think you're next.
yes. You know, we've talked about how...
would you either pull the mic down or move towards...
oh, I'm sorry. I'm sorry. Please excuse me.
we've talked about how large the investment was going
to be, but what I want to know is what... Portion of the investment
remains taxable and for how long? And does it exceed the long-term public infrastructure
burden? I might need some help answering that question. If you could email it to me, I could get it answered for you because I don't know the answer
to that. You don't? Okay. That's all I've got. Thank you. I yield. So this might be a good time to say that members that have questions that you may come up with later or someone may send
you later, why don't you send those to, in the next week, send those to justin and justin, you can compile them. I'm not asking you to edit them or anything else. Just compile them and we'll get
contact information through the greater chamber. And get answers to those questions
for you all. That way it's one centralized place, and we can track if they get answered.
justice lewison, you're recognized for a question.
thank you for coming, by the way. I know that you're loving to stand up here this long. So you mentioned that there's a
community advisory board? Yes, we're setting that up,
yep. So I just wanted to know who's
on it and how are they appointed? So it's basically just been so
far we've been in our conversations with the
people we've been exposed to locally. We've invited a few people.
representative bennett has been invited. The mayor of wrightsville has
been invited. The the overseer of the 145th
street sewer district has been invited. We we attended the planning
board meeting earlier today. And would like somebody from that group to be a part of that.
and we're open to more people joining, for sure.
and we're trying to have our first meeting in two weeks from today. Thank you.
donna, is your light broken too? Ms.
massey, you are recognized for the questions.
my question is... The property next to your property, how, I mean,
is it a lot of woods next to your area? Because you mentioned there's a
lot of hunting that's taking place on that property now. And once you start to build,
what's going to happen to, I guess, to the animals, the deer
or what have you that's there now?
so, yeah, it's a wooded property to start. And the hunting has ceased.
and we have done surveys for rare species habitat and rare species presence, and we haven't found any
of significance. And that's being,
it's been reviewed by the army corps of engineers to make sure we're compliant
with all the fish and wildlife service standards. But in terms of the deer, they would not be able to walk across the data center site.
in general, the wooded area on the site that would remain, they'd still have access to. Thank you.
does anyone else have a broken light and wanted to ask a question? Justin, I appreciate if you'll
turn that into general services as well.
thank you very much. I appreciate it. You've been a great help. Thank you all.
I hope I've answered your questions. And like I said, we're here.
and we're ready to answer more. And if I haven't been able
to answer some tonight,
I apologize and look forward to interacting more. Thank you.
just some information that you can also find on the website.
I would call your attention, justice medlock, to the second page of this,
and you will see, and we can get you the larger version, you can see what the
proposed site plan layout would be in that bottom left-hand
picture. So you can see what the buildings will look like
from the perspective of those pictures as well. Again, I know that we all want
certainty and I can tell you that from an economic development perspective,
and I appreciate the questions about why here, why arkansas, and the answer is,
and I can unequivocally state this, in this world, no amount
of incentives will make a bad site good. I want to restate that.
no amount of incentives will make a bad site good, which is why
from the incentive aspect of the discussion, we never even get into that until the company has made the
decision. It's between us and typically a couple of other folks. We are competitive,
but we're not going to be the largest offerer of incentives because, as justice blackwood has stated
many times, we're not. The most wealthy state in america.
and our goal is to become a much more wealthier state.
we can't create a scenario by which certainty will also preclude things going up.
I know you folks have a really difficult job.
every two years when the reassessment process happens.
I don't know what's happened to your property tax rates, but
my bill's gone way up and it's fair because it's being equitably applied
across your homes, your properties, as well as mine. So we can't ever guarantee that
something's not going to go up because we're in the midst of approving the
going up every other year. What we can do, though, is we can look at a project
like this, and if you turn to that back page, we can look at if the project were to fully develop at the $6
billion number that the company has provided, that those 15 buildings would equal to.
you can see from just this project,
it does not include the project at the port, but from just this project what that would equate to in terms of county revenue the library
the hospital, the road fund, and in my opinion, most
importantly, the pulaski county special school district.
when you look at over $24 million, $24 million of new money coming into the pulaski county school district
to help educate our kids, to give them better resources, better buildings. Teachers better pay.
we can go on and on and on. This truly becomes an opportunity for the future that will allow our young folks,
and as tad said, his 20-year-old son and his children, an opportunity to make a life here in
pulaski county while we're
obviously creating new careers. So with that, we appreciate, I
know this went a lot longer than many of us, many of you wanted, and I certainly
understand, but it's really important that we answer the questions that people have with factual information so that as
additional questions come up, we can also have the opportunity to answer those.
in meeting with justice ward, as you've heard, we've offered...
to come to meetings in her ward and have these same conversations.
I live in western pulaski county. I'll go anywhere in the county that you guys want to have a
meeting and have this conversation. So we will do that because it's
the right thing to do for our citizens to have all of the information,
understanding especially that the regulatory bodies are doing their work.
as we speak. So judge hyde, members of the quorum court, thank you
for your time this evening and we look forward to talking with you soon.
jay, mr. Dessel, vintrell, mr. Bethel, thank all of you for taking the time
to come and spend
with us tonight and thanks all of our citizens that have come out to hear from y'all and answer these questions.
without objection, I'm going to recess for 10 minutes.
a lot of these folks, our guests, I think are probably going
to leave. You've probably come for the part or the part is done that you might have come for. But it will also give all
of us a chance to stand up and stretch our legs for just a few moments. So I have currently 8.43, so
at 8.53 we'll sit back down and we'll gavel back in for our business section.
if everybody will please take their seats. I'll remind you in case you
turned your phones back on, please silence them once again. I'm sure there's a lot of important conversations
going on and so please move to the hallway for those.
madam clerk, we're back on the record. Okay.
members, in your packets this week, oh,
hers is not on. Thank you. I just wanted to acknowledge,
yes, I wrote the time down. Thanks.
very good. Going back to our agenda, in your package you had the minutes.
from our last meeting. Hopefully you've had time to read them and when someone's ready I'll accept a motion to adopt. Members you've heard the motion
you've heard the second. Are there any additions or deletions to the minutes from our last meeting?
there being none, madam clerk please call the roll for the
acceptance or the adoption of last month's meeting. Ms.
metlaw, mr. Elliott, mr. Stowers, mr. Mccoy.
mr. Robinson, mr. Baker, I'm sorry, I'm tired.
ms. Young-baker, my apologies. Mr.
keith, ms. Curry, ms.
massey, mr. Person, ms. Blackwood, ms.
lewison, ms. Capps, ms. Davis, 15 ayes, 0 nays.
thank you, madam clerk. Thank you all
for approving minutes. And madam clerk, now, when you're ready, please give
us the committee report.
I have three committee reports. May 26. 2026 to the presiding officer
of the pulaski county quorum court, we your committee of the agenda to whom was referred items 26i28, 26i29,
beg leave to report we've had the same under consideration and
herewith return the same with the recommendation of due pass respectfully submitted
curtis a. Keith, chair.
may 26, 2026 to the presiding officer of the pulaski county quorum
court, we your... Your committee of the agenda, to whom was referred items 26i, 27a, beg leave to report.
we've had the same under consideration and herewith return the same
with the recommendation of due pass as amended. Respectfully submitted, curtis a.
keith, chair. May 26, 2026, to the presiding officer of the
placid county quorum court. We, your committee of the agenda,
to whom was referred items. 26 I 31, 26 I 32, 26 I 33, 26 I
34 beg leave to report. We've had the same under consideration,
and herewith refer these items to the plask county planning board, plask county quorum
court for further consideration and recommendation. Respectfully submitted,
curtis a. Keith, chair.
thank you, madam clerk. Any unfinished business?
there being none, we move on to new business. Madam clerk, please read
for us resolution 26i35. A resolution regarding regulation of high-intensity
digital infrastructure facilities in unincorporated areas of
pulaski county. You said 32?
wait a minute. I'm sorry, I thought he said
32. Okay.
I've got 26i35. Is that correct?
we had a mix-up in the agendas in the ordinances earlier
today. I have it. I just was not in the order
of him calling it. So apparently the mixture is up too.
we got it all right now? Yes, I have it.
my apologies. So, madam clerk, now will you
read for us resolution 26i35? Yes, ma'am. All right. A resolution expressing the
willingness of pulaski county to partner with the city of maumelle and the arkansas
department of transportation for the following project, interstate 40, highway 365 interchange improvements and
highway 365 widening. Justice starr, is she recognized for the motion?
move. We need an option. Members, you've heard the motion, you've heard the second.
does anyone have any comments or questions regarding resolution 26, I-35?
there being none, madam clerk, please call the roll for the adoption of resolution
26, I-35. Ms. Davis, ms. Capps, ms.
lewison, ms. Blackwood, mr.
person, ms. Massey, ms. Curry, mr.
keith. Ms. Ward?
yes. Ms. Young-baker?
yes.
mr. Robinson? Aye. Mr. Mccoy? Mr. Stowers? I'm sorry, mr.
stowers, what'd you say? Mr. Elliott? Ms. Metlock? Aye.
14 ayes, 1 absent.
madam clerk, are you going
to give us the tally of that vote? I said 14 ayes, one absent. Well, I wasn't paying
attention, apparently, did I? Congratulations, justice stowers, you've passed your
resolution. Madam clerk, read for us now resolution 26-I-36.
a resolution expressing the willingness of pulaski county, partnered with the
arkansas department of transportation, for the following project. Perform pavement preservation work on highway 386 from
highway 365 to highway 834 before transferring ownership to the county.
justice ward, you're recognized for the motion. Move for the adoption. Second.
you've heard the motion, you've heard the second. Is there any comments or
questions regarding resolution 26i36? There being none, madam clerk, please call the roll
for the adoption of resolution
26i36. Ms. Mitlock? Aye. Mr. Elliott? Yes.
mr. Stowers? Yes. Mr. Mccoy? Yes. Mr. Robinson?
aye. Ms. Young-baker? Yes. Ms. Ward? Yes.
mr. Keith? Yes. Ms. Curry? Aye. Ms.
massey? Aye. Mr. Person? Yes. Ms. Blackwood? Aye.
ms. Lewison? Yes. Ms. Capps? Aye. Ms. Davis?
yes. 15 ayes, zero nays. Thank you, madam clerk. Justice ward, congratulations.
you've passed your resolution, 26i36. Madam clerk, now when you're
ready, read for us, please, ordinance 26i27 is amended.
lots of paper over here, sorry. Okay. I'm trying to make sure that I have the, okay.
an ordinance to establish quarterly meetings of the pulaski county planning board
to promote community engagement in regard to land use policies and
for other purposes. Justice person, you're
recognized for the motion. Move the motion.
it would tell me it's about 1030 at night.
how about they move to send a dupe as? No, no, move for the adoption. Move for the adoption. You've heard the motion,
you've heard the second, and the 10 o'clock news will be on in just a few minutes.
are there any questions or comments regarding ordinance 26i27 as amended?
I'm hitting my button. And so justice davis has broken her light too.
you're recognized. Thank you. I appreciate that my fellow...
jps wanted to have a compromise, but this is not it. It does not specify that
certain things have to be addressed at the quarterly meeting as opposed
to the other meetings. So what would prohibit the planning board
from saving all development, you know, what have you, for the two o'clock meeting and not
the 5 30. This is not the compromise. If it gets voted in, luckily, we'll have a new judge who can
hopefully change the time so that the community can be involved. So thank you questions wave
your hands curry you're right. I do want to thank the planning board for providing us
a detailed listing by jp district that does help us to have a better idea
on what's on those agendas agendas and we know that we had we didn't totally compromise but this is better than some
of the things we had in the past as far as informing the
reform court members thank you I yield any other questions yes
yes my light's not working someone turned off all the
lights I guess justice black would you recognize for a question yeah I just wanted
to ask um because I think erin
had brought this up last time and I just wanted to clarify something because he said if does he have to wait until quarterly meetings to get
certain things passed if he's so I was wondering how big you
know each infrastructure thing has to be to be put on to the
quarterly meetings because I just didn't know whether you know, people that are doing
construction, do they have to wait until the quarterly meetings to get things passed,
or would it be done during every meeting? Is that a question? Can anyone answer this for me?
I don't know if there's anybody here. So this is not the agenda meeting,
this is the quorum court meeting, so it's really just among us here. And I feel confident that...
if there's an important issue or a hot issue and someone requests that that quarterly
meeting be held in this month because this issue is being debated, and it's done
in a reasonable amount of time where people can plan
for the later meeting, I don't think that's going to be a big problem.
I think that we can work together on those things and work them out.
and I'll just throw this out there as a wild, wild
supposition, I suppose. You know, if we were in washington county or sebastian county or I think
jefferson county as well, we might consider, like they do, having a subcommittee of three
to five people who provide that oversight and input to the public works department.
and there might be another one that... Would provide that oversight
and engagement with the parks, our parks organization within public works.
you know, that is common, and
that's really where the court's power is, is in those subcommittees.
I wish I was in subcommittees. So I just throw that in there.
thank you. You know, he had mentioned that, and I had a confusion
on that, so I just was wanting to know. Thank you. 10 o'clock news will be on
in a minute. In a minute. I'm sorry. You're recognized.
yes, I just want to point out that in the ordinance states, quorum court believes quarterly
meetings held outside of normal business hours will promote community engagement regarding
land use matters. During our agenda meeting,
we made it clear that in regards to land use, the land use ordinances,
those meetings will be held at the quarterly meeting.
okay. Thank you.
any other questions? Madam clerk, please call the roll.
I have a question. Where does it say in the ordinance that only land use?
what we spoke about at the quarterly meetings it says it
can be doesn't say it has to be no yeah I did not say that I didn't say what you said I was
just reading the we came and spoke when planet was here that's exactly what we talked
about any other questions
madam clerk, madam clerk, please call the roll for the adoption of ordinance 26i27 as amended.
ms. Davis? No. Ms. Capps?
aye. Ms. Lewis? No. Ms. Blackwood?
no. Mr. Person? Aye.
ms. Massey? Aye. Ms. Curry? Aye.
mr. Keith? No. Ms. Ward? Yes.
ms. Young-baker? Yes. Mr. Robinson? Present.
mr. Mccoy? No. Mr. Stowers?
yes. Mr. Elliott? Yes. Medlock?
aye.
nine ayes, five nos, nays, and one present.
justice person, you failed to pass your 26i27 as amended. Madam clerk, now read for us
ordinance 26i28.
an ordinance amending ordinance 25or52. 2026 annual budget, pulaski
county, arkansas to appropriate road and bridge funds for various projects.
justice stowers, you're recognized for the motion. Move for the adoption. Aye.
members, you've heard the motion. You've heard the second. Are there questions or comments
regarding 26i28? Questions. Justice ward, you're
recognized. Yes, my question is basically I was a... I had a question as far as
these listed projects. Are these all the projects that are going
to be that the monies are going to be appropriated for the nine projects that's on here?
I'll take that. No, there's several smaller
projects like the improvements
that we discussed at college station elementary school. Okay, because I got beat up by
my constituents because I voted no and I didn't see college station on here.
so now it's going to be thrown in there.
so no, it's not now. It's the, what you're doing is appropriating.
you're really not voting on each project, just like in the budget year.
you won't vote on each project. Project selection is
at the authority of the county judge.
the transportation is a special area where the county judge is
given the authority to make those decisions and projects. So because these didn't get
appropriated in the budget season last year is why we're providing that general explanation
of what the projects are. Okay, so this wording means nothing, that the quorum court
acknowledges that the following projects will be funded upon adoption of this ordinance,
and it only has nine items. So we're saying that we're
going to throw in some small projects. I'm saying that it also
includes other projects as well.
okay, well, like I said, I got beat up because... I didn't know that college
station, I didn't see college station, that's why I didn't vote for it.
well, I'm college station, it's clear that it's on there now and I hope that you'll vote for it. Okay.
any other questions?
madam clerk, please call the roll on the adoption of ordinance 26i28.
ms. Metlock? Aye. Mr. Elliott? Yes. Mr.
stowers? Yes. Mr. Mccoy? Yes. Mr.
robinson? Aye. Ms. Young-baker? Yes. Ms. Ward?
I mean, yes. Mr. Keith? Yes. Ms.
curry? Aye. Ms. Massey? Aye.
mr. Person? Yes. Ms.
blackwood? No. Yes.
capps? Aye. Ms. Davis? No. 13 ayes, 2 nays.
thank you, madam clerk. Justice stowers? You passed your ordinance 26 I
29.
that was 28. I'm sorry, I jumped two. I'm sorry.
you did pass 28, and madam clerk, now read for us, please. 26 I 29.
an ordinance amending ordinance 17or-12, pulaski
county personnel policy, as amended to make technical corrections. In accordance with act 848 of
2025 to comply with the recommendations
of the arkansas association of counties.
justice stowers, you're recognized for the motion. Move for the adoption. Second.
members, you've heard the motion, you've heard the second. Are there any questions or comments regarding ordinance 26i29?
there being none, madam clerk, please call the roll for the adoption. Of ordinance 26 I-29 miss davis
yes uh stand by madam clerk mr
chairman this is this is a regular ordinance it's not an
emergency ordinance so this is just first reading okay well thanks
for letting me know that in advance so the ordinance is placed on first reading and
that moves us to the late filing. I will recognize the motion
to suspend. The rules to hear a late filing.
make a motion to suspend the rules. Second. You've heard the motion,
you've heard the second. This is a non-debatable motion, I believe.
so, madam clerk, please call the roll on the motion that's on the floor now to suspend the rules
for a late filing. Ms.
davis. Yes. Ms. Capps.
aye. Ms. Blackwood. Yes.
mr. Person. Yes. Ms. Massey.
aye. Ms. Curry. Aye. Mr. Keith.
yes. Ms. Ward. Yes. Ms. Young-baker. Yes.
mr. Robinson. Present. Mr. Mccoy.
yes. Mr.
stowers. No. Mr. Elliott.
no. Ms. Medlock.
12 ayes, 1 present, 2 nays. The motion to suspend the rules is passed.
madam clerk, please read
for us ordinance 26i37.
an ordinance imposing a temporary moratorium
on the acceptance, processing, and approval of applications for development, construction,
or siting of data centers within the unincorporated areas of pulaski county.
justice davis, you're recognized for the motion. I move for the adoption.
you've heard the,
did I get a second there?
second. You've heard the motion, you've heard the second.
are there comments or questions regarding 26i37?
curry. Justice curry, you're recognized for a question. Yes, thank you.
I would like for our attorney to come forth and share a letter that we've got
from the attorney general on an opinion. Yes, ma'am.
would you come forth and share that? I've provided a copy of it to each member of the court.
each member. Thank you. So what I want to clarify, in this particular opinion,
it states distinctly on a question that was asked back
in november of 23, if a city or
county does not have a digital assets mining operation functioning
in their city or county, can they prevent permitting or building of a digital asset
mining operation through ordinances? It distinctly says no, a city
or county cannot prevent a new digital asset mining. Operation through an ordinance
that bans digital asset mining. Because cities and counties have only the power given to them by the constitution or
statute, local ordinances that conflict with state law are invalid.
that's correct. Just wanted to make sure. That's your friends in the big
building respecting local. Well, yeah, local author.
you recognize her question? Yes. Well, I know that says
preventing. Let me correct the record. Justice blackwood, you recognize for the question.
that says preventing, right? I'm sorry? That what he stated was what
she quoted from tim griffin. That municipal governments,
county government, they cannot prevent. Right, right.
what this is, is a moratorium. This is just to get it out
to the public, to get them to look at it, to get them. It's not a prevention.
it's not against having the data center.
it's just a moratorium. You have a far greater
appreciation to the word moratorium than I appear to
have. I think that a moratorium is
putting a stop to something. Well, we put a 12-month limit on it, so it wasn't a stop.
we have a 12-month limit
on here.
so that is not a stop and that's not a prevention. Can you tell me if that's a prevention by saying a 12-month limit? I think you're going to get sued if you pass it. And do you think, I mean,
that's your opinion, correct? Yes, ma'am. Okay, and but can we, okay, okay, I yield. But we're not putting a stop to this.
we are just putting a moratorium on it.
mr. Stowers, you had a question. Thank you, sir. My understanding was that there was an amendment tonight. Is that on the table? I didn't see it when I arrived
here. It's here. It's here on my desk. Okay.
I would like to make a motion, well, a
substitute motion that we adopt the amendment to this item.
second. And I can expand more
on that if needed. Just hang on. So I think, mr.
parliamentarian, there's nothing wrong with a motion to amend during debate. Actually, it's customary.
so you've heard the motion. You've heard the second.
mr.
tote. Does madam clerk have a copy
of that amendment? Madam clerk, will you please
read the amendment for us?
certainly.
an ordinance imposing a temporary moratorium on the acceptance, processing, approval of applications
for the development, construction, or siting of data centers within the unincorporated. Areas of plac county this looks
like the same thing I just read
you get underline. They have underlined language on the sheet you have madam clerk. Yes, so that's the that's the
memory they want you to read this is grandfathering.
article 8. Grandfathering the ordinance
shall not apply to projects that have exceeded binding utility interconnection agreements,
or have received final county approvals, or have submitted complete interconnection
application and received preliminary utility study acceptance prior
to the effective date of this ordinance. Judge, do I stop the floor,
sir? So we have a motion, we have a
second, and we have the amendment has been read. I think I'm halfway on track
on this. Are there any questions or
discussion on the amendment? I have a question. Point of order, yes, ma'am?
you said, are there any questions? I said I had a question. Oh, okay. Would you pull your mic up?
you're soft-spoken and I'm really hard of hearing. Yes, so I read the amendment. It's already
in the ordinance. So why are we having an amended?
because it's like on the page. It's word for word already
in the ordinance. So what is being added? It's the same thing that's
already in there. It's on the, well.
if it's already in there. Judge, after you recognize me, do I still have the opportunity
to speak? I just said you recognize me. Thank you, sir. Thank you. So, this is to grandfather
wren, the project that has already been in the pipeline
for two and a half to three years. I can only speak for myself.
I can support the one-year
moratorium if we grandfather in avio, and I know I butchered
your name as a company, but if we could grandfather
them in what this ordinance, excuse me, this amendment is, what it would do,
that would allow us to us time then
to put a moratorium on any new developments of data centers over the next
12 months. I think that something we need
to keep in mind was, and those of you who have been around this community for a long time are aware
of this, in 1973, fred smith in pulaski county
in the city a little rock place fedex corporation in little
rock. Using a lot of the same arguments we've heard here
tonight related to impact on utilities and infrastructure, the community rejected fedex.
and fred smith took fedex to memphis, where it remains the largest private employer in
shelby county. This is a
once-in-a-generational economic development opportunity, and I fear we're going to cut
off our nose to spite our face, just
like we did with fedex. So here's what could happen, a couple of things.
one is... The company that's already
invested millions of dollars, already invested millions of dollars, avo,
into their project, could come
after us as a county for financial liability.
it's also patently unfair. The company that's been
in the pipeline for two and a half to three years. And have been through the process, they've crossed their t's, they've crossed their I's
with our planning department, with the public service
commission, and yet to say, hey, we're asking you
to put a 12-month hold on your project. Well, here's what's going to happen.
I'm going to sue our butts off. And number two, if I'm them, what I'm going to do is I'm going
to pull my project and take it to lono county, where they can get water off the river.
or wherever they decide
to go.
number two, to that regard,
is that pulaski county would be blacklisted by anything to do with what is the future, no
doubt, based on the stock market, based on everything else that we see in the news. The future is ai.
future is data centers and I'm sorry I have the floor and what we will be doing is cutting us off our nose to spite our face because every other company that looks at pulaski county like fred smith did in 1973 and
was told to go elsewhere they will go elsewhere in other counties in their school districts,
other counties. And their school districts and their local governments will
benefit from the employment and
from the economic development of these projects.
so that's why I'm proposing
this amendment this evening as a compromise, as something that is a bridge.
avion, avo, however you say it,
they've been through the process. I think we need to grandfather
them in with the amendment and then we need to pass the ordinance as amendment as amended two data centers here
in pulaski county one in little rock at the port google and then the avo project down
on the south part of the county that will give us 12 months that will give planning and zoning plenty
of time to come up with rules regulations to guide us forward. And so that is the purpose
of submitting the amendment. It is a compromise. I'm trying to bring us together
to where we can say, hey, we're going to stop any new development
of data centers, but for those that are already in process. And by the way, my understanding is,
and somebody can correct me, but my understanding is even though mayor scott has come forward with some rules and
regulations, ordinances, resolutions, that the google data center at the port would
be grandfathered in. So all I'm asking on behalf of this company that has spent a heck of a lot of time,
they've spent a heck of a lot of money to invest
in this community,
all I'm asking...
is that we don't cut them,
cut their knees out from underneath them. I yield you.
thank you. Any other questions on the amendment or can we get
to the vote? Being none, madam clerk, please call the roll on the adoption
of the amendment for ordinance 26. 6i 37 yeah I still got that
miss davis no I mean this caps no miss lewison no ms. Blackwood?
no. Mr.
person?
the person. I have questions, but present.
no. Ms. Curry?
aye. Mr. Keith? Yes. Ms.
ward? No. Ms.
youngbaker?
mr. Robinson? Aye.
mr. Mccoy? Yes. Mr. Stowers? Yes.
mr. Elliott? Yes.
ms. Medlock? Aye.
eight ayes. Six nays, one present. So the amendment
to the ordinance is passed. It takes eight votes, a majority, to pass the amendment.
now we're back to discussion or debate on the ordinance as amended.
is everybody clear on that? Clear as mud.
I said, so we have passed the amendment, and the amendment is now part
of the ordinance. It's now the ordinance as
amended. Correct. And so now we are back at discussion
of the ordinance, but it's as amended. You're recognized, mr. Person.
mr. Attorney, county attorney, question.
given state law, how much teeth does this really have? What is it actually doing?
well, I think the moratorium would prohibit any additional data centers for that 12-month period.
but I think the grandfather clause, the intent is that if it's already started,
it wouldn't be subject to the moratorium. I don't think it cures the
problem that I have with this particular legislation, but I think it certainly helps.
got it. That's all I need to know. Thank you.
justice blackwood, you're recognized.
yes, and since you said that moratorium means to stop or ban, since that was your opinion,
so you think that even now with the... Amendment added to it that means we're going to ban all
data centers and uh and specifically the the two that are already ongoing being
grandfathered in it would apply to new additional data centers when I
asked you a minute ago about about the moratorium you said that means to ban it did not
you said we had very different views on what moratorium meant and you said it meant to ban
so now that we've got this new
one listed, why would that not consider us banning all? It would be
for new projects. You would be stopping new projects. Right, but for 12 months,
right? For 12 months, it's a
temporary. Correct. Correct, okay.
that's where I wanted to get. Get it because because you were
stating that it meant to ban last time like it meant to ban completely all all data
centers and that's not what we were doing at all we were just having a more so I was trying
to get the correct how what you were saying thank you uh
non-working life that wants to speak curry you're right
attorney, I want to ask, even
though we have the amendment with the added to not try
to stop, not to stop the already applicants that are
in process,
where would we stand? With stating in the state law that we don't have the
jurisdiction. I don't believe you do, ma'am.
I believe that arkansas... Based on...
I'm sorry. Yeah, I'm trying to understand that.
I believe that arkansas law provides, as the ag identified
in that opinion that you quoted
earlier, that you lack the authority to regulate data centers. In the way that you're proposing to do so
in this legislation. Thank you. How about you?
justice ward, you're recognized. Okay.
so what we have, it says you have requested my opinion.
so this is an opinion,
right?
that is correct. This is the state of
arkansas. His opinion. Justice robinson is recognized for a comment. Thank you, judge.
so I guess my question is, is the hang-up in, I've got to find it again, I'm sorry.
is the hang-up like article 3? Because article 3 gives, I
guess, this body the power, I guess, to extend it.
we can repeal it. But, I mean, if you extend 12
months, another 12 months, or another 24 months, or another 12 months, is that,
I mean, in your legal advice, which I'm not an attorney,
I'm not going to pretend to be one, is that the holdup
is the ability to keep extending this? I'm not sure.
I understand. I don't think that's what the problem is.
what the data center or so the article 23, the two laws that
are at issue in this are the arkansas data centers act of 2023 and then a 2024
legislation called the digital asset mining businesses.
and it specifically in both laws permits the construction of data centers in arkansas.
all and while you can regulate them what you can't do, as the ag says
in the opinion,
is ban them altogether. And I think that's what the moratorium do.
and it's why I'm concerned that we'd end up in litigation. So would it be?
more advantageous if we change article 3 to where we didn't
have the ability to extend it another 12 months to where it really would be
just a set amount of time to give the planning department
their ability to come up with said regulations, which I think this is all they're
trying to do. I don't want to speak for them, but trying to come up with some type of regulations,
which we've already given them 90 days. I don't think article 3 is the
issue. Okay. All right.
thank you, iu. Let me step in here. This is the county attorney.
he is legally obligated to give you his advice on an issue that he thinks may create a legal problem or doesn't create a legal problem.
arguing with him to get him to change his mind,
it doesn't go anywhere. It's the county attorney's
legal opinion,
and he's giving it to you. It's up to you whether you follow your attorney's opinion or you don't, just like
in any other engagement with an attorney. Justice davis, you have
something? Yes, sir.
I'm a little worried when the county attorney thinks that this moratorium is a ban.
it's not a ban. It's just a pause to say, hey, get the regulations.
and so I'm a little worried when we criticize, you know, he's just doing his job.
that's what I'm trying to explain to you. If you don't agree
with that opinion, then don't take the advice and vote however you'd like to vote.
but he is obligated as the county attorney.
he is, in fact, your attorney.
and he's offering you his opinion, which he's obligated to do, and now you're obligated to either take it or ignore it and go about what you're going
to do. Does that make sense?
if mine wasn't a question for you, it was more of like a statement to the other jpcr voting that moratorium wasn't a ban,
it was just a pause. So that was all my yield. Thank you.
justice baker young. Young baker.
the attorney general's. Opinion. Your advice to us is that this
ordinance is basically not appropriate for us to pass because it goes
against what the attorney general is saying that in arkansas law yes I yield. Justice medlock.
that goes along with my question um the way that it is I'm having a hard time hearing
with all the comments that are coming from thank you so the way that it is written we don't
have the power to do that, basically. Okay, thank you, I yield.
and so I'll ask. We're probably going to miss the news tonight altogether.
so please, if you have a conversation to be had, sit out
in the hallway and have it. There's enough distraction and confusion and tired people. So please respect.
the process and remain quiet.
justice, you're recognized. Mr.
kemp, who do you believe is the regulating body regarding this issue?
if it's not us, who then? The arkansas oil and gas commission. That's who issues the permit as
provided in the code sections. So the authorization comes
from the oil and gas commission and that's who
issues the permit. Okay, I yield. Thank you.
justice capps, you're
recognized. Thank you. So I have concerns
about the legality and voting for something that is not legal.
I fully supported the moratorium. It feels like a good solution,
but I'm now concerned if it's considered illegal. I think we've had a good conversation tonight
about hearing from the different entities. I appreciate their input on
whatever their internal regulation, and I would like to
think that this body is still really committed to try and push some external regulation
through ordinances and things like that, as is in our purview,
as well as land use passage. So I just,
I've. I'm very concerned about this. I want to address these.
I think there's a lot of mistrust between data centers and the community and
having some regulatory issues in place so that it's not just them regulating themselves,
but in fact there's a backstop. It's an important step, but I am similarly concerned
about something being legal. So I just want to put it out there that I think,
at least from my perspective, I think a lot on these bodies. Remains very concerned
about addressing this issue.
anyone else want to take a bite at this apple?
I have one more. Justice bedlock, you're
recognized. So if with it amended,
we're grandfathering what's in place. So going forward. We are simply saying we need
regulations in place, correct? And those regulations,
we're giving the planning board
12 months to define those particular regulations. Am I understanding that correctly? You're thinking about it the
wrong way. I think it's partly accurate,
but it's also true to say that you're... Stopping any new data center or
digital asset. Well, okay, so I'm sorry,
I don't mean to interrupt, but if I'm understanding, not necessarily, it's just saying they have
to go through the regulations that are put into place in the next 12 months.
I don't think that's right. For 12 months, you will not have a new one.
there isn't going to be a process. But you're correct, ma'am, that
you would have grandfathered in those projects that have already started.
okay, I yield.
justice stowers, you're recognized for... Judge, I'll be brief, sir. It doesn't matter at this point.
I will be very brief. So we sent...
I believe it was two resolutions and two ordinances back to planning at our agenda meeting
for study and consideration, and we asked them to turn around recommendations within
90 days. Is that correct? Yes, sir. And so the moratorium's
for a year. Let's just say that in nine
months that planning and zoning have had all the public hearings,
everybody's given input. We've all come together as a community and figured out how
we can do this together. And then let's say that this body passed at that point in time.
we could go back and say, okay, now we've got the rules,
regulations in place. You're absolutely right.
and so we could, if needed, in other words, we could reduce the time frame of the
moratorium or we could increase it. This body could. Correct.
okay. Thank you.
I want to be here later. I can stay here.
you're recognized.
so if, let's say that... This ordinance as amended
fails, that the majority, whatever, votes.
does it go back to the original and we'll have to vote on it as well?
so as amended, if it fails,
then it fails. Thank you.
I yield.
I think everybody's had their say. Madam clerk, will you please call the roll for item 26i37 as amended.
as amended. Does everyone understand what they're voting on? Yes.
medlock. Mr. Elliott. Mr.
stowers. Yes. Mr. Mccoy.
present. Mr. Robinson. No.
ms. Young-baker. No. Ward.
present. Mr.
keith. No. Ms. Curry. No.
ms. Massey. Aye. Mr. Person. Yes.
ms. Blackwood? Aye. Ms.
lewiston? Yes. Ms. Capps? Aye.
ms. Davis? Yes.
ten ayes, two noes, I'm sorry, four noes, one present.
ordinance 26i37 is amended, is passed.
madam clerk, you should have a
second ordinance that was a late filing. And I'm sorry, it's a
resolution, it's not an ordinance,
but it was a late filing. It's 26i38, it's in your packet, if you all. It is really just a resolution
needed for a grant application that's come in at the 11th hour as happens
from time to time. You ready for me to read it? Please read it.
resolution of the quorum court
of pulaski county to utilize federal aid transportation alternatives program or recreational trails program funds.
who is the sponsor on that,
madam clerk?
justice massey. Justice massey, you're recognized for a motion.
I move for the adoption. Second. Members, you've heard the
motion. You've heard the second. Are there any questions
concerning resolution 26i38? There being none, madam
clerk, please call the roll for the adoption of resolution 26i38.
ms. Davis? Yes.
ms.
capps? Aye. Lewiston? Yes. Ms. Blackwood? Aye.
mr. Person? Yes. Massey? Aye. Ms. Curry? Aye.
mr. Keith? Yes. Ms. Ward? Yes. Ms. Young-baker? Yes. Mr. Robinson?
yes. Mr. Mccoy? Yes. Ms. Towers? Yes. Ms.
elliott? Yes. Ms. Medlock? Yes. 14 ayes, 1 absent.
ms. Massey, you've passed your late-filed resolution. Congratulations.
and members, that concludes the business portion of our meeting.
are there any... Judge hyde, I'd like to make my motion at the appropriate time.
you're recognized for a motion.
I'd like to make a motion of censure to justice phil stowers. Second. Members, you've heard the
motion. You've heard the second. Is there any explanation? Thank you, judge.
there's been some incidences where mr. Stowers, who's a dear friend of mine, I've known him
for almost two decades now, but regardless of that friendship, there's been some things that he has
done that I think is inappropriate, breaks decorum when it comes to communications
with other justices of the peace and also members of the public. And so for that matter,
I'd appreciate a good vote. We need to keep decorum here,
and I think it's appropriate that we adopt this motion.
thank you. Any other comment?
clerk, please call the roll. One question. Mr. Parliamentarian.
what what how many votes does it take to pass a censure it's
a majority of the body so eight votes so eight votes and what what is what is the
ramifications of a censor if it passes there was no penalty attached
to it it's just a admonishment by the body okay madam clerk please call the roll for the censure motion miss
matlock mr.
elliott? Mr.
mccoy? Yes. Mr. Robinson?
aye. Ms. Young-baker? Yes. Ms.
ward?
present.' keith? Yes. Present. Ms. Massey? No.
mr. Person? No. Ms. Blackwood?
aye. Ms. Lewiston? Yes.
capps? Aye. Davis? Yes.
eight ayes, three nays, three present, and one absent. Give me that count again.
eight yes, three noes, three present, one absent.
thank you, madam clerk. Justice mccoy, your censure
of justice stowers. Is approved. Do we have any other late filings, amended, or no more tricks?
okay.
members, that brings us to announcements. That's announcements here at the bar. Does anyone have any announcements?
the news did just start, by the way, I'm just saying. Um, this side,
any announcements from anybody here at the bar? Great.
that takes us to public comment. We have a healthy stack.
folks, that the limit on public comment is three minutes.
tony orr. Tony orr here.
regina norwood. I think that's mr. Orr coming. Are you mr.
orr? Okay, mr. Orr, you're recognized to make your public comment and you
have a three minute time limit on those.
go ahead, sir. Just all of you.
but at the end of the day, we want people
to come sell us.
you care about me?
ask them, don't give breaks. Let's check this thing out.
energy is atm. That's all I
got. Hold.
open up, corn core, if you wanna be, take it over the cavern thank you, mr.
orr. Thank you. Safe travels home.
is regina norwood here?
thank you, ma'am. Safe travels home for you, too.
brenda henson.
pull the microphone down toward you a little bit. Thank you, ma'am. Your time?
I don't know.
it says it's green. No, it's on. It was already green. But anyway, thank you for my
time. I just have a couple of things I want to lift up.
much of it has already been said. But there are three concerns
that are priorities for me. A county resident, health, education,
and public safety. And I recently learned,
and I've been coming for a few years yet, and this one always comes up. I understand you have a hiring
freeze, and I understand it goes
across the board. Well, all of you who live in the city, you have the
little rock police department. I have the pulaski county sheriff's department.
and since I've been coming forever, no, long before I even started coming. There's always been a shortage.
and somehow or another, you
feel that it's public safety. It's okay
to have a hiring freeze. In the little rock, I mean the
palaske county sheriff's department. That might work for you.
it does not count me as a taxpaying county resident that I'm important and my public safety is important.
when it comes to budgeting, public safety should have its
own budget that is fixed, in my opinion.
and I've worked in the corporate world, and there were certain things that
was going to be paid no matter what. Public safety was one of them.
thank you ma'am. Thank you.
brooke butler? Is brooke butler here?
are you an architect? You have handwriting, printing like an architect.
it's very neat. Thank you for everything
tonight. I would just like to extend my
thoughts on the moratorium. I think that I would like
to see it outside of the unincorporated parts
of pulaski county and I would have liked to see it having
to not have these grandfathered in ones especially considering as was just said,
public safety. We don't know necessarily exactly how many diesel
generators are going to be at that google facility out
near sweet home, but a lot of these industrial generators are
the size of a train car. These are ginormous, huge generators.
and in order to run these generators, they require having a lot of diesel on hand.
and so generally for a data center of around 100 megawatt hours,
they are going to need about 100,000 gallons of diesel fuel on site.
so this 100,000 gallons of diesel fuel that is on site, if there is a fire,
which are fairly frequent
with data centers, is the sweet home volunteer fire department capable of putting out a fire?
that is fueled by 100,000 gallons of diesel fuel, as well as all of the electrical components that are involved. That's just something that I am
concerned about, and I would like to extend that knowledge
out to people to think about who is capable of putting out those kind of
fires and if those resources are there available. Thank you.
thank you, ma'am.
magdalene jones or james welcome. I want to thank the pulaski county quorum court members for
bringing forth these resolutions and ordinances to protect the constituents
of pulaski county. Especially those of us that will be directly impacted by
these data centers. I came here today as a fellow
arkansan, a stem professional, but most importantly as a concerned member of the community as I reside in college station and I'm
located just five miles away from the four billion dollar data center that is going to be built in sweet home. As someone who's nine to five
is working as a data management it application developer and someone who has a passion
for technology, I'm very familiar with data as well as the rise of ai.
it was just a few months ago that I had a request from one of my end users on wanting
to implement an ai agent with the platform I develop and
support.
in the past year alone, I have witnessed how ai has not only impacted our personal lives, but in our corporate lives, our jobs, our government,
and even our military, with it all being driven by business and big tech.
it's everywhere and it's happening too fast. But what is also making waves and has been mentioned already
tonight is how these data centers destroy the communities they are placed in. Every single data center has
had an impact on surrounding environment, notably the air quality, noise pollution, groundwater,
and waste production. That is a fact.
it is impossible for that to not be the case considering the
sheer amount of resources they take to function
on a day-to-day basis. And that is why we have been here tonight talking about public pledges and contracts
because we all know what comes with these data centers. I reviewed the little rock
data center's website and I'm appreciative of energy in central arkansas water in the little rock regional chamber
for attempting to put all information in one central location, but it did not lower my concerns.
reading about google's and energy's public pledge does not
give me comfort because a public pledge is not going to protect any of us or hold
anyone accountable. Regulation does that. Big tech has predominantly
placed these data centers in vulnerable communities due
to cheap land and resources. I have lived in college station my entire life.
my mother has lived in college station her entire life.
my family has spent four generations in college station, and there has not been anything even remotely close
to the money that is being spent on these data centers that has gone
into that community, into wrightsville, and into sweet home.
at what cost is arkansas' economy worth our community being impacted when there
couldn't even be transparency to begin with? I don't care
about the economy. I don't care about booming business.
I don't care about the odd 30 to 100 people that these data centers are going to employ.
I don't care about the fact that this is the largest monetary contract arkansas has likely seen in its history,
especially considering that
sweet home, wrightsville, and college station won't really see a decent fraction of that money, especially
considering the tax breaks that google and avio have likely have received. I know earlier it was mentioned
that 24 million dollars would go into the pulaski county school district. I just want to call
out that that's not even 1% of the 8 billion that goes that has been put
into these data centers. It's like 0.3%.
tonight concerns were brought regarding billing and money which is important
but no one has mentioned at the moment that these data centers are built and are up and running.
that the land that they're on can no longer be used for farmland, it can no longer be used
for nature or housing due to the irreversible damage that they do on the soil on top of whatever infrastructure that we
plan on spending. There have been studies conducted that data centers
could contribute to over one-third of asthma deaths by 2030.
that is not fear-mongering. That is a statistic
from the researchers at ehp. Environmental health project a non-profit public health
organization committed to studying the impact that the industries man appreciate your
comment understand that the
languages a wrap up with the I'm I will be participating in
any public meetings that will be taking place and I'm looking forward to learning all that I can regarding about the data center but in
the day this is my life my family my friends, my
community, we live here. This is our life. This is very real.
and I appreciate all that y'all do for us. And I hope and I pray that we
can find a way to do more. Thank you for your time tonight.
thank you.
bill schell, katie
kornreich.
the eanes still here?
good evening, ms. Eanes. You know the drill. Three minutes, please. Comment card.
so should I combine my comment for both of the items?
interest of time and the time yes I would I would take my three minutes and all right
sure sure um so we voters had
wanted this body to reject the quarterly meetings compromised compromise which won't contain
the entirety of county business the only people speaking in favor of that was the
planning board and the staff the voters were
against it so I'm kind of disappointed that you voted with the bureaucracy.
also today the commission voted to combine the quarterly
meetings with the first public hearing for data centers and I don't
know if that's something you intended but they also seemed kind of surprised that they were gonna
have to meet an extra four times so they're trying to kill two birds
with one stone. The other thing I wanted to comment
on was the data centers. And I've... I'm an it professional for
over 30 years and I'm not against technology but I do think that it's time for a timeout.
the community has lots of questions and our community has people that we we would like to ask those questions.
I am glad that the moratorium passed but I was not for that amendment because that does a a disservice to the people that
these data centers are going to be impacting now. We do believe that the
potential impact of data centers on electric rates in central arkansas is one of the most
important problems. Based on the legislation passed in 2025, entergy can begin
charging rate payers for new capacity without getting full approval
from the public service commission. A data center's main need for
water is cooling and there is no reason why the local infrastructure should be used to provide potable water
for cooling a data center. Treated wastewater can easily be used as is
in many cooling applications. And also, large data centers with large evaporative cooling
systems could cause some microclimate changes around the center and could extend
for several miles.
those are just some of the concerns. And sometimes I feel like a human battery in the
pulaski county matrix. Um the need for our money, land, electricity, water,
and we have no seat at the table. So I just, I think that
outsized water and electricity use by data centers are the reason enough to establish the
common sense guardrails and the perpetual daylight and harmful noise scientifically studied
to negatively impact health. It's unfortunate that people are going to have to live next to these facilities.
facilities. I wouldn't want to live next to one.
please try and wrap it up. Okay, thank you. So the temporary moratorium
on data centers is good, but the amendment is rejected. Please listen to the needs
of your voters going forward. Thank you so much. Thank you.
safe travels home.
is terry dran in here?
hello, ms. Drennan. Hello, and thank you for the opportunity to speak. I feel like this moratorium was
taken very, very seriously by all of you, and I very much appreciate that. I'm sad about the amendment
being added to it. All I heard from the people on this side
of the room tonight was money, and I'm going to tell you something. My sister lives in rockwall,
texas, and in the dallas-fort worth area, there somewhere around 160 to 200 data centers
and over the last three years her electric bill has gone from around two
to three hundred dollars a month to she's real happy if her electric bill is a thousand
dollars in a 2,500 square foot house every single month. I feel like and I say this every
time I'm in front of this body arkansas is the natural state and tonight I
heard natural state be damned. Money, money, money. And I'm really, really sad. And where
was the transparency before? Why were there no public
meetings when this was all in front of the planning board? Why were
we not told then? This room was
full tonight. All across the united states, people are rising up. The people of the united states don't want these
data centers. The people of arkansas don't want these data centers. When he builds his
building and he goes away, he has his renters, he's gone. He doesn't care
what's left. We're what's left, and our property, and the
wildlife, and nature, the natural state. And if I have any time left, I would
like to yield it to judge
griffin. Thank you, ms. Drennan. Chris centifonte?
good evening, judges. Thank you so much for your time on this whole thing
with the data centers. It's a big thing, and it's something
that really should not be rushed. It needs to take time. I'm happy that it passed. I did
not like the part that was added to it
with the grandfathering in. First they said it was only
one, and then all of a sudden it was two. Too that we're being grandfathered in. And
yes, I feel that it's been a big disservice to the people of pulaski county not
to have any transparency, not to know what's going on. I
mean, when you build a property, now you have
to be notified. There are things, there are protocols. There is nothing with these data centers. We
know nothing. It's been in the works for three years now. And we don't know anything about it.
and I think that is a travesty.
and another thing that I'm upset about, and I'm president of pinnacle mountain
community coalition, and our people wrote a petition because we want the meetings to be changed so people can be there.
I mean, what is it if you can't be there and protect your
property and know what's coming in your backyard? And to leave it to quarterly
meetings will not address this problem for us. So thank you for your time. Thank you
for listening to us. We appreciate what you do. Thank
you. Thank you, ms. Santofonte. Safe travels home.
ms. Scully. Speak, judge.
you're welcome. Thank you guys for your time and service. Pulaski county. If the goal is to maximize public
participation and transparency, why are we recommending and
drafting ordinances to have quarterly meetings? It
seems like we're catering to developers, in my opinion. I didn't hear not one justice
ask. The companies, the name of their investors,
that's important information for the public to know. They did ask. Did you? I didn't hear
that. It was asked. Okay, I apologize. You guys need to ask them
to list their investors. We have a right to know that. You should want to know that. Item
26i28, excuse me, ordinance 26i28. It has a listing there
of an ordinance amending ordinance 25 or 52 to
appropriate road and bridge funds for various projects. We
don't know the projects. That can be anything. You guys know
the projects. If we're going to have this type of ordinance listed,
we have a right to know what those funds are being used for. What are those projects?
because we certainly don't want another bike trail out in
district 10. Thank you. Thank you. Stolle, safe travels
home. Mr. Griffin, you're up now. Thank you, judge hyde.
good evening, everyone. In 1872, lewis carroll wrote a
book, sorry, looking through the looking glass, and he quoted... This line,
when I use a word, it means just what I want it to mean,
neither more nor less. The question, said alice, is
whether you can make words mean so many things. The question is, said humpty dumpty, which
is to be master, that's all. When I use a word, it means what I want it to mean. The word moratorium
has a common meaning. It does not mean stop. It doesn't mean ban. It has never meant ban.
it means delay, pause, cool your jets. You heard a
lawyer tell you that a word means something that no dictionary says it means.
blackstick law dictionary has a definition of moratorium. It doesn't say ban. I've read the
cases of arkansas. No arkansas case says moratorium means ban. So a lawyer can tell you
something and be wrong. Now that's okay, but when you base your legal action
on what the lawyer tells you, and then you make an exception to one private party
for the world, that wrong becomes a lawsuit. You, congratulations, you just
made a legislative record to allow any taxpayer in this county
to sue any permit that's issued for avio because you have given avio, the only company
in the world, an exception
from regulation after saying you want to have regulation for every other subject.
congratulations. Lawsuit coming.