SPANISH FORK, Utah — Spanish Fork's city council voted in favor of an amendment to city code that could set the stage for a data center to move into an existing warehouse at the mouth of Spanish Fork Canyon.
It comes after months of back and forth between city leaders and a Provo-based company called Volition that put forth the proposal.
“Everybody’s going to get a data center trying to come to their city at some point," said Teresa Wood. "You need to have something to protect you now.”
Wood is among the many locals who’ve been speaking out on this issue since she learned of it last month.
“Even if you say we need data centers, we don’t need them in our backyard," Wood said in a previous interview with Fox 13 News. "We need dumps too, but I don’t want a dump in my backyard.”
She hopes city council has provided those protections by setting several guardrails: requiring energy grid isolation, technology restrictions and caps on the use of resources.
“I genuinely think they have done the best they can within the legal framework available,” said Madi Bringhurst, another neighbor who's been vocal about the project.
Having once considered pulling out altogether, Volition CEO Jeff Chavez is now ready to move forward with the process.
“There’s going to be another couple months of completing the engineering, then we go into permitting,” said Chavez.
City officials said the project will go ahead much like any other development, with the council needing to approve a site plan and development agreement prepared by Volition.
Once that’s done, construction can begin, and Chavez said that will bring in an excess of a thousand trade jobs and around 300 operational jobs at full build-out.
Chavez estimates the million-square-foot warehouse will be a $3 billion project taking up to three years to complete.
Locals remain skeptical of the resulting product.
“I don’t trust Volition any more than I did six weeks ago," Bringhurst said.
But Chavez said he hopes to address any outlying issues as they move ahead.
“I think those who have genuine concerns will realize that we’ll be pretty forgettable after a while,” said Chavez. "We'll be pretty quiet over there, doing our thing."