Buffalo Common Council to vote on data center moratorium

Buffalo, NY (WBEN) The Buffalo Common Council will vote Tuesday on whether to impose a two year moratorium on data centers in the city.

Mayor Sean Ryan says the city previously looked at a moratorium. "We had been working on a one-year moratorium as an executive order, and then we kept in close contact with the state legislature and the governor, and so the state came in with a one-year moratorium. So we pulled back our executive order; it wasn't necessary anymore. Now the council has a two-year moratorium that differs significantly from the states, so we're going to take a look at that," says Ryan.

But while the concern is companies coming in and buying land, he has a caveat. "We have to make sure that we don't inadvertently sweep up Roswell Park's computers, M&T Banks computers, Kaleida's computers, so we're going to be checking with all the University of Buffalo. So we're going to be checking with all these institutions that have rather large computer storage facilities to make sure that this somehow doesn't affect them," warns Ryan.

Count Councilmember Mitch Nowakowski among those willing to vote for the moratorium. "I believe that a moratorium will allow the city of Buffalo to get in conjunction with the state of New York, with an ability to be able to better get ahead of data centers that are being proposed through you know the region, but also the country," says Nowakowski, who would like to take it from an urban planning standpoint. "I believe that a moratorium would allow the city of Buffalo planners to get ahead of if a data center was proposed in the city, where would it be most applicable or not? What environmental impacts would transpire if this happened? So we really have to take this from a planning perspective, but ultimately from an environment standpoint as well, to because of the the amount of water and electricity, and can the grid handle this? And ultimately, where would this, you know, where would a proposal go? I mean, we're we're a city of a quarter of a million people, and you know, we we hit with the vacant land that we do have. We would like it to be used for housing, and and and where in this city would this even be proposed? And even if it was appropriate, where where would this be? So taking this from a municipal planning perspective is not only the right thing to do, but it's it's the appropriate thing to also do for our city, our built environment, and for our residents."

Leah Halton-Pope says she wants to make sure the city has the right infrastructure when it's ready. "A lot of people have an issue with environmental hazards and what it does to communities around it," she says. She notes underprivileged communities tend to be most affected. She says a moratorium allows to make sure the Green Code is up to date.

The Council votes this afternoon at 2pm.