Stephens County Leaves Data-Center Rules Unsettled After Unanimous Delay

Stephens County commissioners unanimously postponed adoption of a proposed ordinance for data centers on May 12, leaving potential countywide land-use rules for the facilities unresolved. The board discussed gathering more information, examining how other counties handle similar ordinances and potentially holding a work session for public input.

The delay matters because the county has not decided what standards, if any, will govern data-center development. While commissioners moved ahead separately with accessory-structure updates, the data-center measure was neither adopted nor rejected, leaving residents and prospective developers without a final answer on the county’s approach.

The proposal had been headed toward public consideration in late April. A revised April 28 Board of Commissioners agenda listed a second and final reading of proposed Land Use Ordinance changes along with a land-use public hearing. By May 12, however, commissioners separated the matters: accessory-structure updates were adopted, while the data-center ordinance was postponed unanimously for further study and possible public discussion.

Commissioners’ recorded position was not to settle the substance of the ordinance immediately, but to seek more information and compare other counties’ approaches before acting. They also identified a work session as a possible venue for public input. The record does not describe individual commissioners’ views on particular standards, nor does it include the text of the proposed data-center rules or the adopted accessory-structure changes.

The accessory-structure changes were completed as a separate action, according to the May 12 agenda packet. The data-center ordinance remains postponed; no later official action in the record establishes that it was amended, brought back for a work session, approved or put into effect. The April 28 agenda confirms that a public hearing was scheduled, but it does not state what happened at that hearing.

The next concrete public step would be a commissioners’ notice setting a work session or other meeting where residents could comment, followed by an agenda item and vote on the delayed ordinance. Until then, the central questions remain open: whether the proposal will return unchanged, be revised after additional study or face another postponement.