The bonanza of new, large data centers popping up in Ohio has just begun to reach Cleveland. Local officials are weighing how to manage the arrival of the centers, which use large amounts of electricity and have proliferated to support artificial intelligence.
Nationwide, public opinion has swung against building new data centers, polling by Embold Research and the energy and environmental news outlet Heatmap found.
Cleveland City Council plans a hearing this coming Thursday on a data center moratorium. Brian Kazy, the chair of the Utilities Committee, said the committee will hear from data center supporters, opponents and neutral parties.
“I’m going into the hearing with a complete open mind,” he said.
And Cuyahoga County government has given its cities some recommendations for handling new data centers. One suggestion is that local officials decline to sign non-disclosure agreements with developers.
“I think communities should have the right to define how data centers can operate within their jurisdiction,” Jenita McGowan, the county’s sustainability chief, said in a phone interview. “They can create some zoning regulations. They can create maybe some energy and water stipulations, noise, setbacks, things of that nature.”
Exactly what data center developments are headed Cleveland’s way? That’s hard to say. Even McGowan turned to a low-tech and age-old form of information sharing: word of mouth.
“I have heard anecdotally — from people who probably wouldn’t want to go on the record — that the pipeline of larger data scales being planned for Northeastern and Northwestern Ohio is pretty big,” she said.
Greetings from Gavin
Mayor Justin Bibb visited Long Beach earlier this month for the U.S. Conference of Mayors annual gathering. There, he met with Gov. Gavin Newsom, a possible 2028 presidential contender.
Newsom made time to talk with Bibb and a group of mayors as part of the Blue Cities/Red States Coalition, Bibb said in an Instagram post. Akron’s Shammas Malik also was at the table.
The coalition is a 501(c)4 for Democratic mayors in Republican-controlled states that Bibb launched with a grant from the moderate think tank Third Way.
Cleveland’s mayor has engaged with several members of the Democrats’ 2028 bench.
He chatted with Pete Buttigieg at Karamu House in March and interviewed Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear at last year’s Democratic Mayors Association conference. He co-chairs the climate group America’s All In with Newsom and Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker.
Cuyahoga County Democrats keep their leaders
We told you last week that the Cuyahoga County Democratic Party was poised to vote on its leadership.
David Brock and Juanita Brent retained their seats as chair and executive vice chair of the party, respectively. Brock was unopposed and Brent defeated a challenger at the meeting, held last weekend at Lakewood Civic Auditorium.
It appears the only drama was in the power supply. The weekend’s storm knocked out the electricity during the meeting. The Bay Village Democratic club posted a video to Facebook showing central committee members taking their oaths of office under the glow of the auditorium’s emergency lights.
