The first Battle of Pageland Lane ended in favor of landowners, but both sides will regroup before the final decisive battle.
Early Thursday morning, the Prince William County Planning Commission voted 4-3-1 to recommend approval of the first application for the controversial PW Digital Gateway.
Commissioners Cynthia Moses-Nedd (Woodbridge), Qwendolyn Brown (Neabsco), Juan McPhail (Potomac) and Patty Kuntz (At-Large) voted in favor of the project. Commissioners Joseph Fontanella Jr. (Coles), Richard Berry (Gainesville) and Tom Gordy (Brentsville) opposed it.
Commissioner Robert Perry Jr. (Occoquan) abstained from the vote.
The vote came after a nearly seven-hour marathon public hearing, easily among the longest in county history. It started at 10 p.m. Wednesday and didn’t wrap up until 4:34 a.m. Thursday. The commission did not cast a vote until after 5 a.m.
The raucous Wednesday/Thursday hearing was on the request from dozens of landowners to designate 2,139 acres in western Prince William County for data centers. Specifically, it was to change the land in the Comprehensive Plan currently designated as agricultural/estate and environmental resource to technology/flex, parks and open space, county registered historic site and environmental resource overlay.
Supporters ended the night with an edge in speakers with 84 in favor compared to 67 opponents.
Of those in favor, at least 57 were landowners who are part of the PW Digital Gateway application, and five were representing companies associated with the project.
More than 220 people signed up to speak, but 85 dropped off before their slot as the hearing stretched well into the morning. By 2:30 a.m., only a small but dedicated core of supporters and opponents remained to watch the proceedings.
Berry first made a motion to only approve the northern portion of the proposal but did not get a second. He then made a motion to recommend denial and still did not get a second.
Brown then made the motion to recommend approval of the application. The motion included recommendations for unspecified noise and environmental regulations to be added to the proposal.
Brown said the project “presents an opportunity to transform Prince William County’s future in a profound way.”
Gordy and Fontanella made an unsuccessful bid to table the proposal for county staff to get more information. “We need more time to get this right,” Gordy said.
The proposed change would target 1,321 acres as technology/flex, 807 acres as parks and open space, 439.8 acres as environmental resource protection overlay and 9.6 acres as county historic registered site.
The project, which proposes 27.6 million square feet of data centers along Pageland Lane, has quickly become the most controversial and contentious local land-use proposal in decades. Opponents and proponents have launched personal attacks against each other, and it has spawned recall efforts against Gainesville Supervisor Pete Candland and Board Chair Ann Wheeler and a federal lawsuit against Candland.
County planner David McGettigan said it was important to restrict development to data centers because they have less employees and generate less traffic.
“We don’t want rezonings for any industrial use. We want to limit it to data centers,” he said. “There’s less demand on infrastructure from data centers.”
The original application was submitted last summer by landowners along Pageland Lane who wanted to change the land designation on about 800 acres for the project. The Board of County Supervisors later expanded the request to cover 2,100 acres.
Supporters say the project will provide a huge economic boon to the county in an area that’s no longer rural.
Opponents say such large developments would decimate the character of the county’s rural area; they have raised concerns about the availability of power, effects on water quality and the potential that the buildings could quickly become obsolete as technology continues to improve.
The staff report says if the Comprehensive Plan amendment is approved, the potential data center usage would range from 13.2 million to 27 million square feet and support 1,471 to 5,048 jobs.
The low end is more in line with rezoning requests filed by Compass Datacenters and QTS Realty Trust Inc. rather than the 27.6 million square feet touted by the proposal’s supporters. The combined Compass and QTS projects cover 1,636 acres and 18.42 million square feet.
The hearing was only for the Comprehensive Plan amendment, not the two rezonings. However, if the Comprehensive Plan update is approved, it will weigh heavily in favor of the rezonings.
“It’s only a guide. It’s not regulatory in nature,” McGettigan said. “When the planning office reviews a rezoning application, we’re going to look at consistency with the Comprehensive Plan.”
Those on both sides of the project have shown up to nearly every Board of County Supervisors and Planning Commission meeting for the past year to plead their case. Everyone was out in full force Wednesday, with 88 people in line to sign-up for the hearing when registration opened at 5:30 p.m.
Opponents held a rally and press conference outside the building before the meeting started, with similar talking points that have been raised over the past 12 months.
Opponents of the PW Digital Gateway data center project before a September 2022 rally before the Planning Commission's vote to recommend approval of the project.
Gordy said the proposal might not be necessary because land exists in currently targeted areas.
“What we have heard is the data center market remains extremely strong in Northern Virginia,” said Deputy Planning Director Meika Daus. “We’ve not heard that there is a cooling of the data center market.”
Gordy said the county needs an estimate of how much it will cost the county to support the project through infrastructure upgrades.
“The county’s going to bear some of that burden, and the main rationale for supporting this is the benefit financially to the county, but we haven’t accounted for cost,” he said.
County staff were criticized for bringing the project forward before completing a study of the noise ordinance, impact on the watershed, cost of associated infrastructure and review of the existing Data Center Opportunity Zone overlay district.
Fontanella Jr. was concerned that county staff didn’t have concrete answers to some of the panel’s questions.
“I’m hearing a lot of ‘to be determined’ or ‘we’re studying that,’ and it sort of begs the question of whether we’re ready for prime time without solid answers,” he said. “I would like to have a much better, deeper understanding of the impacts on not just the Occoquan Reservoir but our drinking sources that include the Potomac River.”
McGettigan presented the staff report to the commission. Those in the atrium frequently criticized his hesitation on answers and called him a “dummy” and “idiot.”
As McGettigan said the recommendation of staff was for approval, the atrium erupted in a chorus of boos.
No one presented on behalf of the applicants, as it was billed as a county-initiated project, although dozens of applicants spoke at the hearing. Representatives of the companies planning construction also provided input.
Those in the atrium cheered when commissioners or speakers asked questions or made statements they agreed with and jeered during speakers or staff answers they did not support. At one point, Potomac District Commissioner Juan McPhail, who was serving as chair for the meeting, told those in the atrium to cut down on their outbursts and was greeted with yells of “no.”
Bruce Ridgeway, an applicant, was booed from the atrium. He responded, "Boo to you out there ... Where were you guys at when I was fighting for my home eight years ago? Don’t tell me what I can do to my home now.”
As Ridgeway left the board chambers and entered the atrium, which was mostly full of opponents, he shouted “woo” and held up a pro data center sign before heading home.
Supporters claimed those in opposition primarily lived in Heritage Hunt and didn’t support progressive change and accused them of intimidation.
Rhonda Reese said opponents should not be dismissed because their concerns are valid.
“How dare you guys assume that all of us that are against this are against change?” she said. “You don’t know me”
Two men almost came to blows in the atrium after one supporter was upset because he said opponents had parked outside Candland's house to "intimidate" him. He was confronted when he came into the atrium, but security and police stepped in to separate the men.
Elena Schlossberg said the supporters only favored the project because they were selling their land.
“If you remove the millions of dollars that each of these applicants are making, they would be with me,” she said.
Ali Iman, one of the applicants, said the proposal is “the most studied single project in the history of Prince William County.”
“For over a year now we have been consistently presenting facts about how the PW Digital Gateway is the greatest economic development in Prince William County’s history,” he said.
Melanie Williams, one of the applicants, said Pageland Lane is “a very, very small piece” of the county’s rural area and has been “ completely destroyed by huge power lines.”
“Nobody wants to leave their property, trust me,” she said. “But we feel like there’s no alternative.”
At about 3:20 a.m., Mary Ann Ghadban, one of the lead applicants, called out county Supervisor Jeanine Lawson, R-Brentsville, who has been adamantly opposed to the project. She said Lawson voted in favor of the nearby Gainesville Crossing data center that started Pageland landowners down the path toward the PW Digital Gateway.
Lawson, who was attending the meeting, spoke during the public hearing to counter Ghadban’s point. She did vote in favor of the project, but noted that the data center was not in the rural area, only outside of the overlay district.
“It is not and never was in the rural area,” she said. “They have a hard time forgetting that. We have borders for a reason. The rural crescent is nearby, I will give her that.”
The proposal next heads to the Board of County Supervisors. No date has been scheduled, but officials are planning for an October hearing and vote.
(20) comments
If you thought the September 14th Planning Commission’s public hearing on the Prince William Digital Gateway was great theatre, you should have caught their spin doctoring on September 21st. It was absolutely surreal.
Those who had practiced sleight of hand and slick maneuvering to slide their pet project past an overwhelmed and underinformed public circled the wagons and reverse engineered contrived explanations to cover their tracks. It was a pathetic and completely unconvincing charade.
The next day, circus ringmaster Ann Wheeler sought to quell the inferno by delaying a scheduled Board vote to clear up “confusion”.
I’m sorry, but that’s not enough. If Chair Wheeler acknowledges “there seems to be a great deal of questions and confusion about the process”, then the public hearing held under such conditions could not have been effectively conducted and its resulting recommendation should be invalidated.
Add the fact that a material change to the Comprehensive Plan Amendment was withheld from the public until after the hearing and vote concluded. Regardless of whether this was a product of incompetence or ill intent, you have the makings of a hearing that was not only confused, but seriously compromised. Call for a do-over.
This is what happens when you try to build a sham process around a pre-determined outcome. Corners are cut, rules bent and truth hidden.
While it’s great to have a brief respite, don’t think Dracula is dead. Come sunset, he’ll pull that stake out of his heart and start biting your neck again.
These discussions always are interesting. Every institute in NoVA fails to recognize was this area has become, including the residents. NoVA is a MASSIVE commuter area. People stay here because of the jobs and education, then leave. The amount of people born, raised, and died here is dwindling. Yeah I get it, PWC was once rural, and soon the discussion will be Faquier was once rural. Rte. 234 was built four wide for a reason, as was 15, 29, etc., do you think it was to stay the way it was/is? Nope. Gainesville was a blip in 2000, when I moved here, Leesburg was still only "Old Town", and not a dang thing was developed South or East of Quantico. You can not expect the realities of a BRAC, the relocation of Amazon, Boeing, Multiple Technology Companies now in Loudon, and now Investment Firms moving to NoVA and that things will remain unchanged. If you want rural anymore, sadly it is true, move to Danville, Roanoke, or anywhere South West in VA. Nothing is happening there.
Fauquier and Loudoun. Anyone who lives here as long as you apparently have should really know this. You're welcome.
The a$$hats that denied Disney’s America in the 1980s are getting what they deserve, tract housing and concrete boxes! Hilarious!
That is kind of funny...that is the same area. Although to be honest, data centers are much let congestive than a full-sized Disney theme park.
And you know these are the same people how? That name calling likely has come right back to you.
Who in the heck wants to live in Northern Va? Corporate America makes you drive an hour each way daily to get to a keyboard. The school system was once a draw for families however now they are full of low achieving students and marginal teachers. Manassas City Schools is ranked 130 out of 132 school systems in Va.
Loudoun, Fairfax, Prince William, Arlington all rank at the top of VA and National rankings for schools, why would you cherry pick low performing Manassas City schools? Don't let the door hit you on the way South.
Do you have evidence of these numbers? Surely you do.
They guy who supported it and said, "where were you when I was fighting for my land? And now you come and tell me what I can and can't do with the property I own?" He was absolutely right.
I do agree that they should do studies on the impacts for water, electricity and noise. That is the responsible thing to do. But what will everyone say if those come back as a minimal or acceptable level of impact?
What bothers me the most, is that all of the people who opposed it are concerned about the impacts to the environment and public utilities. Raping tens or hundreds of thousands of acres in Western PWC to build the massive neighborhoods, roads, schools, shopping centers, power lines, etc. that protestors live in has had a far more detrimental impact to what was once rural than these data centers will ever have. No one was there protesting that, except for the rural land owners perhaps. So ravage the land and destroy rural PWC so that I can live there, but after I move there, then stop building? I take responsibility for creating the demand for the growth, which is why I'm in the middle of the road on this issue. No one is going to build these millions of dollars of property's just to spend money. It is needed, and I understand that. But sometimes, "do it in someone else's backyard" becomes your backyard. So if you don't want the inevitable growth, then move somewhere else.
Well said.
Although I don't agree with people not having the right to protest what goes on in their community. "Either like it or move" is not fair to anyone. That being said. I prefer Data Centers over the alternatives and agree with those particular points.
They'll transform PWC as good as Biden transformed the economy. We're doomed.
Oh that grammar.
They don't have the information they need to make an informed decision so the best choice is to make no decision until you do. Especially as Candland ais involved in the project giving the Gainesville district no vote in the matter. He should resign and run on the data center platform. Let's see what the voters want.
Board is right.....This will have a profound change for the county, and NOT for the better and good for residents. What fools.
Once again you can make all the signs you want and give all the heart felt speeches you desire. In the end, the authoritarian tyrants big of small will
choose whatever lines their own pockets or promotes their own Marxist ideology.
Which part.of the decision was Marxist? Using extreme strawmen counters your own points.
Dude, this is straight up Capitalism:
an economic and political system in which a country's trade and industry are controlled by private owners for profit, rather than by the state.
Get your ideologies in order.
However, "The State" is an integral part of the equation here. And is in complete control of where these things are going, especially on land not zoned for them. Citizens be damned!
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