Washington County Commissioner Charlie Schilling, left, responds to Waterford residents regarding the preliminary data center project during the commission’s regular meeting Feb. 12. Commissioners Eddie Place and Greg Nohe listen and respond as well. (File Photo)

MARIETTA – Residents of Washington County continue to approach the Washington County Commissioners during regular meetings with questions, concerns and comments regarding the potential data center in Waterford.

“Last week we had folks speaking over top of others and I will not have that today, to be clear,” said Washington County Commissioner Charlie Schilling.

Reno resident Lynn Cady said she felt the NDA signed by the commissioners was unethical, even though it was legal.

Cady said members of the Ohio House of Representatives introduced House Bill 695 which if passed, would prohibit local elected officials from entering into nondisclosure agreements.

Section 305. 44. B of HB 695 stated, “no member of a board of county commissioners shall knowingly enter into a nondisclosure agreement.”

In order for the bill to go into effect, it would need to be passed by the House, the Senate and signed by Gov. Mike DeWine.

Cady said she was displeased with the comments made by Washington County Job and Family Services Director Flite Freimann during last week’s meeting.

“He talked about how great New Albany is and how the people there make more money but that’s his opinion,” she said. “Do the people here want to turn Waterford into New Albany? I don’t think so.”

She said he compared his displeasure with his neighbors cutting down a tree or adding a fence to Waterford residents dealing with private landowners selling their land to be replaced by a data center.

“If you can’t see why that’s ridiculous … I can’t explain that,” Cady said. “These are billionaires coming in and trying to build enough compute (power) to develop AI for their purposes and it has nothing to do with serving local people.”

Washington County resident Jennifer Dusty said the temporary construction jobs would greatly benefit her family because her husband and 19-year-old son have to travel for work.

“Nobody wants them to come home more than I do and my family could benefit tremendously from this project,” she said. “But the concerns for the health of our community, the environment and future generations far outweighs a few years of good paychecks.”

Schilling said public comment was limited to two minutes in order to give everyone a chance to speak. Dusty said Freimann had more than two minutes last week to speak and so should she.

She spoke about statistics of data center guidelines in other states, HB 695, the acreage of farmland that would be lost to the data center, and the amount of energy the facilities use.

Dusty said she was aware it was private property and the rights of the property owners to sell their land but said there were more factors than that.

“To all my fellow citizens in Washington County, if they go through with this project in Waterford, it will lay the groundwork for a flood of hyper-scale data centers in our beautiful Ohio River Valley,” Dusty said.

Washington County resident Barbara Stewart talked about the Ohio Environmental Protection Agency draft permit which detailed increased limitations in wastewater discharge from data centers. The draft was made public in October and public comment ended in January.

“The Ohio EPA is supposed to be protecting the environment … this draft essentially makes clear they understand the data centers themselves are going to be releasing pollutants into the water,” said Stewart.

Schilling said the draft permit means the Ohio EPA isn’t concerned with what’s released in the water because of the closed-loop systems.

“A reverse osmosis system can strip whatever you need stripped out of the water,” he said.

Stewart said it’s “extremely expensive” to strip the water because of the amount of water in the system.

“The problem is the heat, when you heat water to that temperature there’s no oxygen left in it,” said Stewart. “When you dump it into a waterway … suddenly you’re killing fish and every other thing (in the water).”

There were also questions about who approves the tax abatement. Schilling said the process would be presented by the Southeastern Ohio Authority to the commissioners who would then approve it.

He said there have been no decisions made about a tax abatement.

Washington County resident Shayna Robinson asked if the information involving the SE Ohio Port Authority should be public knowledge because it’s a public entity.

“It was stated last week how there was no public property involved,” she said.

SE Ohio Port Authority President and CEO Jesse Roush said “that is private land owned by a public entity for commercial purposes.”

Resident Justin Arthur asked what information the commissioners were waiting on in order to hold a public meeting.

“What data or information or research are we waiting on to plan something? Or are we waiting until after the May primaries to schedule a community meeting?” asked Arthur.

“This has nothing to do with politics,” said Schilling. “As a commissioner, I’m doing my job.”

Commissioner Greg Nohe said they wanted to have all of the information and parties involved as possible so all of the public’s questions could be addressed.

“Any information that is not certain or with considerate answers to the public would not be in good conscience of the commissioners to release that,” said Nohe. “We don’t have any information that would be beneficial at this point whether that be any or all information.”

He said it was important they had all the information and not just “bits and pieces.”

The commissioners said they wanted to make sure they had all of the information with all parties involved before having a public meeting.

Amber Phipps can be reached at aphipps@newsandsentinel.com