Residents in the audience listen to public comment during Wednesday’s hearing.
Margaret Roarty | Times Leader
Dallas Twp. resident Hannah Butterwick reads notes from her phone at Wednesday’s hearing.
Margaret Roarty | Times Leader
Supervisor Chair Liz Martin welcomes everyone to Wednesday’s hearing.
Margaret Roarty | Times Leader
Dallas Township resident Fern Leard, who recently announced her campaign for State Representative in the 120th Legislative District, addresses the board on Wednesday.
Margaret Roarty | Times Leader
Supervisor Bill Grant speaks during Wednesday’s meeting.
Margaret Roarty | Times Leader
Township Manager Joe Moskovitz addresses residents during Wednesday’s meeting.
Margaret Roarty | Times Leader
DALLAS TWP. — The township board of supervisors approved a zoning amendment regulating data centers during a special meeting on Wednesday in the Dallas High School auditorium, despite pushback from residents who felt the ordinance wasn’t comprehensive enough.
The board unanimously approved a version of the zoning amendment that was revised following a public hearing on Jan. 14.
Still, despite some changes, residents at Wednesday’s hearing and the special meeting that followed felt the board did not take enough of their suggestions into account and urged the supervisors to table the ordinance until a later date.
Many residents, who were opposed to data centers in general, were concerned that the ordinance wasn’t restrictive enough and that neighboring municipalities had adopted much stronger ones.
“I do see that you took into consideration what people were concerned about,” said Junell Guarneri, of Claude Street, during the hearing.
However, Guarneri believed the revised setback of 3,500 feet between data centers was still insufficient.
Resident Hannah Butterwick claimed the board did not take many of the suggestions she and other residents had made at the last hearing.
“If this is truly to protect our township, then why is the ordinance not being beefed up, especially to the reasonable changes that we avidly researched?” she asked the board.
In particular, Butterwick was confused about why the setback requirements along all property lines were reduced from 3,500 feet to 500 feet.
“How are other townships implementing 2,000-foot setbacks, and we can only have 500?” she asked.
However, the board justified its decision to pass the ordinance by saying that some protections were better than no protections at all, as that would leave the township vulnerable.
“My concern is that tomorrow morning, someone from a data center could come into [the zoning officer’s] office and apply for a zoning permit, and then we’d have a data center. That is my main concern,” said Supervisor Bill Grant.
Additionally, Township Manager Joe Moskovitz pointed out that making major changes to the ordinance again would require re-advertising and another hearing, which would take months.
In the end, the board said they would hold a work session next week with interested residents to hear their thoughts and possibly amend the newly passed ordinance in the future.
Under the approved ordinance, data centers are permitted only in the General Industrial District (I-1) and not in residential, agricultural, or commercial zones.
Additionally, data centers will only be permitted by conditional use approval, with no automatic approvals. This means an applicant would have to go through a public hearing before the supervisors.