BRIGHAM CITY, Utah — For the fourth time since mid-May, the group “Grow the Flow” sponsored a public forum on the proposed data center in Box Elder County.
And this time, the meeting featured a member of the Military Installation Development Authority (MIDA) board.
On Tuesday, several dozen people from various walks of life showed up at Utah State University's Brigham City campus. They heard, likely for the first time, from one of the key players who signed off on possibly bringing a massive data center to Box Elder County.
Clearfield Mayor and MIDA board member Mark Shepard was the featured member of Tuesday’s forum. He told audience members how the project was initially presented to MIDA by members of the Stratos group.
“We want to build a large data center on a massive piece of property. That’s really what came to us — we want a large data center. We knew it was a very large data center but we also realized it was 65 miles of property," Shepard said.
WATCH: Poll shows 7 of 10 Box Elder County voters oppose Stratos Project data center
But Brenna Williams, who started a referendum to try and stop the data center, said there has been a lack of transparency, accountability and information from the very beginning.
“Data centers, notoriously, are known for overpromising and under delivering. That is a historical fact. We’re taking all the risks. This seems like a back-room deal and an existential threat to our community," Williams said.
University of Utah Law Professor Brigham Daniels said he did a deep dive trying to learn when news of the proposed data center was announced.
“I spent a lot of time on the Shark Tank blog, and that’s the first announcement I saw for the project. We shouldn’t be scooped by the Shark Tank blog — I think we can do better than that," Daniels said.
Shepard said the MIDA process is what it is and has worked well before.
But he also said: “If the referendum process moves forward, we support that. I run a city, so I am all about transparency; I am all about hearing from the public.”
But one Box Elder County resident, Alison Evans, said she had mixed feelings about what she heard from Mayor Shepard.
“I was excited that there was somebody here, but not overall impressed with what he had to say. I don’t feel like there were any real answers. But I also think that speaks volumes to the public," she said.
Grow The Flow officials said they expect to have more of these public forums throughout the rest of this year.
