Spillover crowd talks to panel on data center project

FORT MADISON – Rumors were circulating that Fort Madison City Hall was going to be packed for Tuesday night’s Planning and Zoning Commission meeting. The rumors were true - so much so that more than 100 hundred residents spilled out into the parking lot due to occupancy restrictions.
Residents were there to talk about the proposed data center that is being planned on the east side of Fort Madison where Hwy. 61 comes down the hill into the city.
The P&Z meeting agenda had two items for discussion. One was data center code review and the other was state code that allows the city to create a two-mile territorial zoning jurisdiction by ordinance.
The data center code review took all the 90 minutes allotted for the meeting with City Building Director Doug Krogmeier outlining a proposed ordinance for what he called High Impact Infrastructure.
“As we began to research it and we were looking at data centers, it became apparent to us that it wasn’t just data centers. There are other things that fit this criteria that are going to come down the pipe at some point,” Krogmeier said.
He said data centers fall into the Industrial 2 zoning and there aren’t a lot of restrictions in that code.
“Codewise, Fort Madison needs to do something with this. We need to adopt something. We need to adjust. Whether that’s restrictions or how deep of restrictions, and that’s what we’re going to talk about. What does that look like?”
Krogmeier said residents should provide as much research as they can to help the city.
“There’s a lot of different topics that come into play. Water use, electric use, those are the big ones that everyone’s talking about. We’ve had conversations with Alliant, and there’s not a concrete answer,” he said.
“We can’t say to them 'you can’t pass that to anybody else'. We can’t do that, but we can write development agreements that say what the developer is 100% on the ticket for, and Alliant hopefully sends us back something saying they agree to that.”
He said noise and heat dissipation are also issues.
“Trust me - we are no experts on this and we are researching it, just like you are. We can go through the fine points of that, but right now, we’re not defining those criteria today, it’s an overview of what a code would look like,” he said.
Any code the city would consider would have to go through P&Z review, legal review, and council consideration before being read into the record up to three times. And no action was taken by the committee Tuesday night.
City Manager Laura Liegois told the crowd the city does not have jurisdiction over any projects currently underway on the hill with the exception of two small parcels of land, of which she said would be buffers for city residents and the city didn’t have to allow construction on those pieces.
But residents spoke clearly in opposition not only to the project, but the lack of transparency around it. Because the property is mostly in county jurisdiction and not in city limits, the city didn’t have standing with the developer, Dustin Wolgemuth. The county has no zoning restrictions around data centers so there was no regulation by that body either.
The panel, chaired by local realtor Barb Asay, referred most of the residents’ questions to Lee County, but said she was happy to see so many people out to learn about how the city was moving forward with future projects.

Fred Newkirk, who lives on Iris Lane, a "stones throw" from the project, had the most colorful comments as he yelled in the room to demonstrate how annoying he said a data center can be when it comes to noise pollution.
“I’m talking at about 70 decibels. That’s how loud this thing’s going to be, 24 hours a day 7 days a week,” he yelled. “We don’t get a break, it doesn’t take a holiday IT GOES UP LOUDER...I KNOW I DON’T WANT THAT IN MY BACKYARD.”
Paul Wilkerson asked the city how the project happened without people knowing what it is, to a smattering of applause.
“I’m certainly not putting the blame on anybody, but in the future, when you are looking at things like this, the sooner we as the public get to hear about it, the better informed we are, and the better informed you can be through us,” he said.
“My money was on Red Lobster… But it’s the secrecy that bothers me. If this is such a good deal, or projects like this were such a good deal for Lee County, where were the dignitaries, where were the people with the plastic hats turning over (dirt) with shovels?”
Wilkerson also addressed a letter written to the city by Wolgemuth addressing electric usage, water, noise usage, and economic development.
“He put these all downs as myths…those are maybes. Big maybes. And if this is actually beyond city limits, do we have to provide water to him?”
Asay said the city doesn’t have answers because they don’t have jurisdiction over any work being done within the county and not in city limits. She said they are working to be proactive where they can be.
Several other residents spoke in opposition to the work being done on the hill.
Lee County Supervisor Garry Seyb said the county has no zoning and can’t restrict the work, but additional projects such as the one proposed, wouldn’t be allowed under a current moratorium the county has on data center construction.
“Was there knowledge there was going to a project up on the hill? Yes. Do we know what that project was going to be? There were several different ideas of what it could be, but there’s no specific project plan submitted, discussed, or approved by the county,” he said,
“He can do what he wishes with his property since it’s in the county like any other individual in the county can do,” Seyb said.
“He did bounce the project at the county level under the current rules, laws, ordinances that we have in place and he’s fine.”
Seyb said since then, the county has put in the moratorium on projects.
“I would encourage you not to beat up this group, or (the county) for the matter,” he said and invited everyone to the county board meetings Tuesday mornings at 9 a.m.
Wolgemuth submitted a letter to Liegois dated Saturday that specified a "proposed AI data center", the first time he's eluded to what work is being done on the property.
Due to the length of the meeting, Liegios said the city will schedule additional meetings to discuss proposed code language as well as conversations around the Iowa code that allows the city to pass an ordinance giving them the two-mile extra zoning jurisdiction.