(The Center Square) – A renewed effort to pause data center development in parts of Caddo Parish failed Monday after commissioners voted 6-4 against sending a proposed moratorium to the parish Planning and Zoning Commission.
Resolution 53, introduced by Commissioner John-Paul Young at the Caddo Commission work session, would have asked the Planning and Zoning Commission to consider recommending a moratorium on data center construction in commercially and industrially zoned portions of unincorporated Caddo Parish.
Two commissioners were absent.
Young emphasized before the vote that commissioners were not voting Monday to impose a moratorium.
“That vote would come later if the PZC recommends a moratorium on data center construction to us,” Young said.
The resolution instead would have started the process by asking the Planning and Zoning Commission to consider the issue and potentially send a proposed moratorium back to the parish commission.
Young said the proposal followed public concern over data center development in the region.
“We have heard an overwhelming number of comments from our public both in person and through other means that they are suspicious and concerned about data center construction in our region,” Young said.
He also pointed to the commission’s previous approval of a tax plan for one data center in the parish.
“We have approved a tax plan for one data center in Caddo Parish and that is probably enough,” Young said.
Young also raised concerns about the financing behind data center development nationally, arguing that companies are taking on too much financial risk.
“If you do even 20 minutes of research about the financing of the data centers in America right now, you’ll see that it looks like 1928 and that these companies seem to be extremely overextended by over 10-fold of their capital capacity,” Young said.
He said those concerns made it prudent to “press pause” before additional projects potentially multiply in Caddo Parish.
Commissioner Chris Krackman seconded Young’s motion. He said sending the issue to the Planning and Zoning Commission for further review was right to do.
“I really wish we would send more things to the PZC,” Krackman said. “I like the way that they deliberate.”
Krackman said he wanted to hear the commission’s assessment before Caddo commissioners made any final decision.
“I really want to hear their take on this and listen to their deliberations on this,” he said.
Krackman added that he could support sending the question involving the five-mile zoned area to the Planning and Zoning Commission and said commissioners could vote on the issue later.
The proposal differed from an earlier effort to enact a moratorium throughout unincorporated Caddo Parish.
Parish Attorney Donna Frazier told commissioners at a previous meeting that a proposal sought to have the commission enact a moratorium directly must first be enacted through an ordinance rather than a resolution.
Because the parish has zoning authority in an area extending up to five miles outside Shreveport’s city limits, a proposed zoning moratorium in that area must first go through the Planning and Zoning Commission before parish commissioners can consider adopting it.
“This is the mechanism to get that process started,” Frazier said.
Most of unincorporated Caddo Parish is not zoned, meaning the process would not have applied parish wide.
