Plans for Project Tomahawk, a proposed data center in Prosper, have come to an end.
Project Tomahawk was scheduled to go before Prosper Town Council on Sept. 8, but the developer, White Rose Partners, chose to withdraw Project Tomahawk from consideration, according to a town news release.
The Prosper Planning and Zoning Commission previously issued a 7-0 recommendation of denial after the proposal received community pushback at a Sept 1. meeting.
“We don’t want to go into communities where we’re not wanted,” said Jeff Eigenbrood, a managing partner at White Rose Partners.
Council will not consider the project, and the application is officially closed, per the release.
In case you missed it
In the application, White Rose Partners sought to rezone 37.3 acres at the corner of Parvin Road and FM 1385 from agricultural uses to a planned development that would allow a data center to be built on the land.
The site would have been ideal for a data center because of its proximity to an existing Brazos Electric Power Cooperative substation that borders the property to the southeast, according to project representatives.
The proposed facility would have been roughly 225,000 square feet and would occupy about 20% of the property, town staff said at the Sept. 1 meeting.
According to a website published by White Rose Partners, Project Tomahawk was designed to mitigate the potential impacts of the center’s water use, power consumption and noise generation.
At the Sept. 1 meeting, commissioners questioned the exact noise levels, scope and possible impact of Project Tomahawk on residents’ electricity rates, aspects White Rose Partners representatives said would not be finalized until later in the development process.
“We need much more detail,” Commissioner Glen Blanscet said. “We’re just not ready.”
Public input
Community members spoke in opposition to Project Tomahawk for more than an hour at the Sept. 1 meeting, including Prosper Mayor David Bristol, who cited a lack of clear guidelines for data centers at the state and local level.
“Residents have made themselves heard on this application, and what they are asking for is not complicated: write the rules first,” Bristol said. “I hear you.”
Katy Murray, a Democratic precinct chair from Little Elm, and Aileen Blachowski, a Republican precinct chair from Prosper, worked together with other community organizers to form Prosper Residents for Responsible Land Use after they saw the Project Tomahawk website, Murray previously told Community Impact.
In addition to over 400 comments in opposition received by town staff ahead of the Sept. 1 meeting, Murray and Blachowski’s petition opposing Project Tomahawk received over 2,000 signatures ahead of the Sept. 8 council meeting.
“My first reaction is relief,” Murray said after White Rose Partners withdrew their application. “We fought really hard.”
Going forward
While Project Tomahawk’s application has come to a close, Murray and Blachowski hope the experience will motivate local governments to build a policy framework for future data center proposals, they said.
“We have a great outcome today, but we still encourage everybody in the community to be vigilant,” Blachowski said. “There will be others, and I hope that we’ll have an opportunity to shape some of those [planning and zoning] parameters for data centers going forward.”
