Good evening.

We are in Council Chambers this n this evening, and we are reconvening the public hearing from the August 17th special meeting.

We will only hear from the members of the public that signed up to speak from last night's public hearing.

And those folks I will call and are listed on my sheet.

If you are listed on the sheet from last night, you can speak in person or online.

So we are reconvening the meeting from last night, so I'm going to start with my speakers.

Is she in the room?

Yes.

Come on to the podium, and then I will call three, and then the other ones can wait till I call your name.

It's incredible.

And one of my favorite things is every day to work when I drive to my workplace on home.

But something else that I see when I drive around though is kudzu.

Um we know this is an invasive vine that devours forests.

Um it's important to remember though that kudzu was initially intentionally planted by communities to control erosion.

Um it started it solved a short-term problem but created a very massive long-term problem that it didn't realize until later.

Um I'm here to ask the council for a thirty-two-month moratorium on data centers.

Um, out of concern that these data centers could become like a kudzu that devours our city's resources.

Um you have already heard earful about the damage that these data centers could bring.

Um I want to highlight some concerns though about the exploitative business practices that they also um are employing to get built.

Um data center companies intentionally target lower income and green spaces for development because the real estate is cheaper, um uh that they still get access to all that city's resources.

We're already seeing this in the way that there's a disproportionate impact for the currently planned data centers that we'll have on districts one and two.

Allowing these facilities to be built without proper oversight will cause lasting harm to these communities.

And works against the city's ongoing work in revitalizing those areas as desirable places to live, work, and invest.

Furthermore, because data center technology is so new, these companies are taking advantage of the legal gaps in regulation, oversight, and zoning to take what they want before a community fully understands what they're signing up for.

You guys have already personally experienced this.

And while I know it's outside the scope of uh the state of this moratorium, um, the impact data center was originally approved in Greensboro for a nine megawatt facility, but it's now been expanded to 20 megawatts.

Um and the company Ray Dean is openly advertising this site in Greensboro as available for expansion for 100 megawatts, seeking investors.

Um, while that data center is outside this moratorium, it's important to recognize that they are already pushing your boundaries to see what they can get away with.

Um the company also is involved in a couple legal battles that I wanted to mention to y'all.

Um they're at uh Ray Dean, the current company of the Impact Data Center is involved in a uh data center in Birmingham.

Um, and uh the the lawsuit that's being brought against it um alleges that the company pulled some uh under-the-table real estate deals to artificially inflate uh the monetary investment to make it look like they put more into the community than they did.

Um the lawsuit also alleges that they that this data center was inappropriately grandfathered in by the city because the city claimed the project was approved before the passage of a moratorium, which the community did after they found out what was going on, um, even though in reality the project actually was still in the process of seeking permits for development when the moratorium passed.

So you guys are even though it looks like some things are in the way, um there's if I'm not being straight with you.

Um Please look up the North Star data um uh impact uh data center policies will get.

Thank you.

Thank you.

All right, I have Jennifer, Danilo, and then Vessa.

Thank you.

Um good afternoon.

My name is Jennifer Barney.

I live in District 3.

Um I was here yesterday, and while I was listening to everyone speak, I was taking notes.

I hope all of you are as well.

Um I counted, I made myself a list of all of the possible threats in everyone's complaints from yesterday.

Uh that list was 25 items long.

Twelve of those items were direct threats to health and life safety.

Um, and each item on that list was extremely complex, one more than the last.

So I don't believe that you all believe that you can actually address all of these concerns and establish proper regulation to protect this community in just four months.

Um that is between 80 and 85 business days that would be shared between this situation and this process and all of the other issues going on with the city, and of course, we know there's elections that are going to be happening during this moratorium period as well.

And I know that families cannot swing that.

They don't have any business days to prepare for these meetings, to do their research, or especially attend these meetings when they happen at 4 p.m.

on a weekday.

That's extremely difficult for families.

Um they'd be using nights and weekends to prepare for this.

They would be definitely forced to sacrifice time with their families to come and participate in these meetings and be a part of this process.

And that is not fair at all.

It's also not fair to claim that you're including community when you are making it functionally impossible for these people to participate.

They make up 54% of the households in Greensboro.

That's more than half that cannot fully participate in this process because of a 140-day moratorium.

Uh this community deserves more time, and we ask that you give us that.