Halifax County commissioners Monday night approved an amended economic development agreement that leads to the anticipated closing on a land deal that will bring a data center to 251 acres of land at the Enfield Industrial Site.
Commissioner Gary Redding cast the sole objection to the deal after having fought unsuccessfully at the beginning of the special meeting to add a public comments section as well as to add a community benefits package to the agreement. In a separate 5-1 vote, the board did agree to allow staff to negotiate for enhanced community benefits from Quiet Data Centers Halifax outside the EDA.
“I felt that the agreement is not complete without the representations from the companies as well as without a community benefits agreement that allows the company to help Halifax County,” Redding said following the meeting. “That includes providing potential funding to help with recreation and providing resources for EMS and other first responders to respond to emergencies that may happen.”
While the amended EDA itself includes a pledge from the company to provide $250,000 annually to the Halifax County School System, Redding argued that broader civic investments should be codified in a formal, separate community benefits agreement.
“I mean obviously more than the $250,000 that’s been offered to the school system,” Redding said. “If we had taken our time we could have assembled some stakeholders, including the Enfield community, the school systems, the community college, and organizations within the community that could have shared some of their goals for a community benefits agreement — some of the resources we don’t have at the moment that a community benefits agreement could provide.”
One of those is the company promising 50 jobs, he said. “That can be linked with workforce development that’s occurring at the community college. That could prepare people by training them by providing them with the skills to do the construction jobs that will be needed at the beginning — all the way to the jobs that will be needed to run the facility.”
At last week’s board meeting, Redding proposed a moratorium on data centers, which will be the topic of a legislative hearing next month. “My goal was for us, in a methodical way, to go through a process that allowed for consultants and other experts to share with us what should go in ordinances, what should go in regulations, what can go in a community benefits agreement because right now there is nothing in our ordinances that mentions a data center.”
He contends that if the closing had been extended, “There could have been more time for us to improve the contract, for us to improve the economic development agreement, to create a community benefits agreement, and to allow the public to have more input. The public has not had, other than the public forum and some emails that county staff responded to, an adequate amount of public input.”
Other counties, Redding said, have had several public forums for people to get feedback and offer suggestions on “whether or not this type of project was one that we should embrace for our community.”
The amendments
County Attorney Glynn Rollins told the board that the company would provide copies of the following documents to the county:
A site assessment prepared by a qualified acoustic consultant to examine the sound profile of the data center on residences and schools within 500 feet of the operations.
A phase one environmental site assessment consistent with standards by the EPA.
A wetlands delineation study performed with standards set by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and the EPA.
An approved air permit issued by the North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality.
A cultural resources study performed consistent with standards set by the U.S. Department of the Interior.
A threatened and endangered species study performed consistent with the standards set by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.
The data center will employ a closed-loop water or liquid cooling system that will result in the minimization of water consumption to the maximum extent possible.
Rollins said the amendment further discusses the water system and that the company will use a closed-loop water, reclaimed water, or liquid cooling system to avoid impacts to water availability and it will not use an adaptive cooling system.
In what Rollins considered to be a significant change, he said the company will encourage the North Carolina Electric Membership Corporation and the Halifax Electric Membership Corporation to protect residential, retail, and other wholesale electricity customers from direct costs incurred to provide electric service to the data center and to prevent other residential, retail, and wholesale customers from subsidizing the direct costs of the company’s electrical service.
He said the amendment notes that the company shall comply in all material respects with all applicable local, state, and federal statutes, laws, rules, and regulations relating to the facility. A material failure to comply that is not cured within 60 days after written notice from the county shall constitute a breach of the agreement.
Rollins said the agreement includes a section that says the company will not convey the property to a third party without consent of the county.
Discussion
Redding gave board members a copy of an agreement from Lancaster, Pennsylvania, that contained matters he had hoped the public would discuss.
He also discussed 40 questions that Scotland Neck resident James Mills had submitted to the county. “The company initially told us that the facility would use, I believe, 3,000 gallons of water per day. Mr. Mills was provided with an answer of 30,000 gallons. Neither this agreement nor a community benefits agreement has this limitation, nor how this will be monitored or reported.”
Redding said the county was told about a noise level of 45 decibels. “This is not in the agreement either. We have no final number, size, and configuration of generators and how that will be monitored and reported.”
He said the company has described the megawatt ceiling as being 88. “That’s not in the agreement. Nor do we see how that’s going to be monitored or reported.”
Redding said the last agreement required that the electrical service contracts include specific rate restrictions or protections. “The company’s revision now says it will encourage electric cooperatives to protect customers from direct costs. What protection did the county lose through this change?”
Rollins responded he did not know. “I don’t know what protection we would have had and I don’t know what agreements are in place. I’ve not seen them.”
It was in the first amended agreement, Redding said.
“Then the question of what did we lose — then the language of that is no longer in there. So we lost that language,” the county attorney replied.
Redding wanted to know what happens if an environmental or public health issue is discovered before closing.
“I’m not an expert on that,” Rollins said. “I can appreciate your question, but I don’t have an answer for that.”
Redding said the EDA is specific about monitoring economic promises. “If jobs and wages can be measured and reported, why can’t material operational commitments also be measured and reported?”
“Is there a reason I’m getting these questions?” Rollins replied. “I don’t have expertise on any of these things you're asking. I’m presenting what the company requested when they saw the changes that we proposed.”
“This is why so many counties throughout the United States are implementing moratoriums,” Redding said. “They are bringing experts and others who can provide feedback on what companies propose to us or what companies put in these agreements.”
Rollins replied, “This board has indicated to staff that you want to consider a moratorium. However, as I’ve said before, you’re too late to do that for this property.”
“But we’re not too late to postpone the closing and bring in some consultants who can provide us with the feedback that we need in order to create an agreement that is able to address protections that I just named,” Redding said. “These are not just representations that I came up with. These are representations that the company came up with that are not in the agreement, nor are they in a community benefits agreement.”
He went on to say that the agreement doesn’t mention decommissioning and that the county has not received any straightforward answers about environmental and health assessments. “As I have traveled to national and state conferences, the panelists all said basically in unison that public input is paramount. We are heading to a closing on Friday with no community benefits agreement or a public benefits agreement that itemizes how this arrangement, this contract, will provide for workforce development for Halifax County residents to work in the facility.”
The Lancaster comparison
In Lancaster, a city of just over 58,000 people, Redding said, data center owners will contribute $10 million each to two funds — an economic development fund to promote economic vitality and the other a sustainable development and clean energy fund managed by the city to advance environmental sustainability.
In the Lancaster agreement, water use is capped at 20,000 gallons per day. “We have examples across the United States of cities and counties that have previously put these agreements together and have these protections and representations,” he said. “Climate and resiliency plans must address waste, heat reuse, heat island reduction, stormwater management, and healthy building strategies. I don’t see anything in the agreement that addresses that.”
He said the Lancaster agreement mandates that all data centers will use 100 percent clean energy. “I look at the agreement and don’t see anything remotely close to that.”
That’s why he asked for a public comment period at the beginning of the meeting. “So our residents who we are elected by and deserve a voice would have an opportunity to give feedback, to share concerns, and, most of all, hold us accountable for what we are doing here today.”
Webb counters
Commissioner Sammy Webb said, “If I reached out to 100 people that supported data centers and came before the board and said I want to make a motion for a public comment section and the people I invited would be pro-data center, they would have the upper hand on the people who were notified, that wouldn’t be fair.”
He said getting the agreement modified so the county could move forward was the purpose of the meeting.
Webb said he didn’t know the circumstances surrounding Lancaster. “I don’t know how many people live there. I don’t know how many other data centers there are. I don’t know the competition. This is on a case-by-case basis. What we’re trying to do is navigate through this process and it’s a hard process. It’s our process.”
He said the company added “a whole lot of language” to the agreement “and I guess we just overlook the stuff they have added.”
In the spirit of disclosure, Webb said the company would submit courtesy copies of the documents Rollins had noted in his presentation. “This may not answer every question that everybody wants answers to, but when you start saying there are government individuals, we are not alone. It’s not like the company is coming here and doing all the things they want to without anybody having oversight on them. They are going to have federal oversight, state oversight, county oversight.”
‘For this project, it’s too late’
Commissioner Jimmie Silver said he had people who wanted to make comments and, like Webb, said it would be unfair.
He also asked Rollins whether the county had lost anything in the amended agreement.
“The original economic development agreement that we executed back in December of 2025, that’s the current agreement that is still in place that currently requires us to close on the sale of this,” Rollins said. “All that was in this agreement was that we would sell property to them for cash and they in exchange would provide a certain level of taxable investment, jobs, and wage levels.”
What the county has been looking at for the last week, he said, were suggestions that came from the board and staff for an amended EDA. “I provided them to the company at the same time you were looking at them.”
Rollins said he had not heard back from the company before last week’s meeting and it wasn’t until this past weekend that the county heard back from QDHC. “I wish I had gotten it last week to get it to you earlier.”
The county attorney said the county has gained much more than it originally had. “I don’t disagree with Commissioner Redding. There are a lot of things about data centers we don’t know about that we need to address, which is why you called for a legislative hearing on a proposed moratorium.”
He conceded, however, “Unfortunately, for this project, it’s too late. We are committed to this company with this land purchase agreement. We are committed under this economic development agreement.”
Additional Redding comments
Redding said one thing that impressed him about QDHC was that it was willing to participate in a public forum last month and that the company had also asked to change the closing date.
Redding said he believed that an immediate vote on the EDA was not time-sensitive. “This is a situation that can involve us approaching the company and asking for more time to have input — not just from the public, but from consultants to improve the EDA and to create a community benefits agreement.”
Barrett comments
Commissioner Thomas Barrett asked Rollins to reiterate that the county was not losing anything by approving the amended agreement.
“No, sir, absolutely not,” the county attorney responded. “With respect to the requirement that the company make a certain level of taxable investment — $250 million in this case — create a number of jobs — in this case 50 — and pay wages at a certain level, we have that in this agreement and always have had certain penalties for failure to meet or maintain those targets.”
He said anything else the company doesn’t do would be subject to some other kind of remedy — not necessarily monetary — but for injunctions to enforce those parts of the contract.
Enfield mayor comments
Enfield Mayor Mondale Robinson said following the meeting that he has been “super frustrated” with the process. “They keep talking about all of the utilities that have been consulted on this project. Everybody knew about this project except for Enfield.”
Enfield is listed on all of the state documents as the sewer provider, he said. “We’re not just the town; we’re also a provider. We’re going to have our own conversations.”
The county, he said, is “having problems right now because they were negotiating in secrecy. If they included people, maybe it wouldn’t have been a new process. I feel comfortable that Enfield is still the sewer provider by the state. If anything changes without us knowing, then that’s a legal problem, but because we are the sewer provider, we’re definitely going to negotiate in a way that’s beneficial for the town of Enfield without all of these mishaps.”
