It's unanimous: Leon County bans new data centers for 18 months
It's unanimous: The Leon County Commission has said 'no' to data centers for the time being through a vote at its July 14 meeting, agreeing to an 18-month moratorium.
"What I'm opposed to is putting it near neighborhoods, putting it near our constituents and the negative effects that it has on them," Commissioner Nick Maddox said.
The moratorium originally was meant to last for a year but was extended, following a suggestion from veteran Commissioner Bill Proctor, allowing it to last through all of 2027.
Critics say the controversial developments consume massive amounts of electricity and water, spike local utility bills, produce loud noise and strain power grids. They have already stoked fear across the Big Bend and throughout the state.
Six solar farm projects are currently being vetted to determine if they can move forward in Tallahassee, a move some worry could create the infrastructure to power data centers in the state capital.
Leon County is joining its neighboring counties in opposing the growing engine of the AI industry:
- Residents in Jackson County, about an hour away from Tallahassee, pushed back on a proposal to bring a solar farm or battery storage facility to that rural county. County commissioners there ultimately decided to place a one-year moratorium on data centers at their May 26 meeting.
- Franklin County followed suit on June 3 with a one-year moratorium on data centers.
- Wakulla County even passed an outright ban. And a staff analysis noted other counties in Florida, including Bay and Walton, are either proposing or have adopted a moratorium or ban.
The Tallahassee City Commission blocked a proposal for a moratorium last month in a 3-2 vote after city officials said such a facility would be impossible to build inside city limits under current codes.
Leon County Commission chair Christian Caban said that during the moratorium, county staff can see how to handle data centers in the comprehensive plan, the local blueprint for growth.
At the same time, both Maddox and Commissioner Brian Welch, who attended the meeting virtually, seemed open to the possibility of data centers in the future.
"I think we need to have conversations over the next 12 months to really, really dig into this, research it, find out what it is, find out if anywhere in Leon County would be suitable," Maddox said. "I think it would be expedient for us to learn more about it over 12 years and be able to speak in a more educated way about it."
And Welch said believed the county should remain open to all economic opportunities.
"This has become like the new boogeyman of political rhetoric ... I think the biggest threat to our community is our lack of economic development, our lack of creating private sector economic investment," Welch said.
"So if a data center economy provided thousands and thousands of jobs in our county that were high-paying, technical sector jobs, then I'm going to want to know exactly what the impacts are."
Current data centers in the Tallahassee area
According to the county, there are four "micro or small-sized data centers" in Tallahassee. For comparison, the typical Publix supermarket is roughly 45,000–50,000 square feet.
- Edge ConneX Tallahassee, 1531 Commonwealth Business Drive: 11,810 square feet
- Lumen Tallahassee, 619 Mabry St.: 8,000 square feet
- Lumen Tallahassee 2, 1416 S. Adams St.: 8,000 square feet
- Pavlov Media Tallahassee, 215 W. Carolina St.: 7,633 square feet
Who uses the most power locally?
According to the City of Tallahassee, here are the top five customers with the highest megawatt (MW) peak loads over the last 24 months. A megawatt is one million watts of power, enough electricity to supply roughly several hundred typical homes at once:
- National MagLab (at Florida State University): 46 MW when running the magnets, 4 MW otherwise
- Tallahassee Memorial HealthCare: 9.5 MW
- State Satellite Office Complex (Southwood): 5.6 MW.
- Amazon Distribution Center (off Mahan near I-10): 4.2 MW
- HCA Capital Regional Hospital: 3 MW
Arianna Otero is the trending and breaking news reporter for the Tallahassee Democrat. Contact her via email at AOtero@tallahassee.com and follow her on X: @ari_v_otero.
This article originally appeared on Tallahassee Democrat: It's unanimous: Leon County bans new data centers for 18 months
Reporting by Arianna Otero, Tallahassee Democrat / Tallahassee Democrat
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This story was originally published July 15, 2026 at 6:47 AM.