A proposed Amazon data center at 61st Avenue and Colorado Street once again took center stage at the Hobart City Council meeting.
The city council approved an ordinance setting in motion a plan to invest a $47 million future contribution from Amazon Data Services.
And No Data Centers spokesperson Angelita Soriano announced, during public comment, that she and three other homeowners had filed a second lawsuit against city officials regarding action taken by city officials on Jan. 7, which included approval of the $47 million contribution by the city council.
Soriano at the city council meeting on Wednesday said she and other residents are continuing to seek a town hall informational-type meeting at which site plans for the data center would be outlined.
“You’re not slowing down; you are fast tracking and the public doesn’t have a full picture,” Soriano said.
The city council, in a 6-0 vote, approved an ordinance authorizing the investment of public funds, a $47 million contribution expected to be given to the city by Jan. 31 from Amazon Data Services, per an agreement approved on Jan. 7 by city officials.
Clerk-Treasurer Deborah Longer said the ordinance, which was approved on second reading, paves the way for the city to make long-term investments from the funds Hobart will be receiving from Amazon.
Opposition to city officials going forward with any plans by Amazon to construct data centers in Hobart dominated the public comment portion of the meeting, including notification by Soriano that a second lawsuit had been filed against city officials on Tuesday in Lake Superior Court.
Hobart Mayor Josh Huddlestun, after the meeting, said he hadn’t read the lawsuit and couldn’t comment until he had.
“The city believes the case lacks merit, as does the first case filed by these four residents in December. We’re confident everything was approved properly,” Hobart City Attorney Heather McCarthy said Thursday.
Soriano, Albina Vegegas-Roman, Barbara Koteles and Joseph Conn in early December filed a lawsuit seeking to vacate multiple actions by Hobart city officials that have “prepared” the way for the possible construction of an Amazon data center on more than a square mile of farmland within city limits.
The plaintiffs allege the two municipal bodies, the Hobart City Council and the Hobart Plan Commission, violated their “due process rights under the constitution of the United States and the State of Indiana.”
In the most recent complaint, the four homeowners took action “appealing the designation of 725 acres of property at 61st Avenue and Colorado Street as an Economic Revitalization Area (ERA) and are seeking to vacate two city council resolutions awarding real property tax abatements and a council resolution approving an enterprise information technology exemption for entities who have said that they intend to develop data centers on property within the ERA.”
The plaintiffs, in their complaint, said the Hobart City Council’s grant of a personal property tax exemption to Amazon Data Services was “arbitrary, capricious, not in accordance with law and not supported by substantial evidence because the council did not validly declare the subject property an ERA.”
The plaintiffs are seeking a declaratory judgment that the tax exemptions granted to the Amazon Data Services are null and void and that the resolutions passed by the Hobart City Council be declared null and void.
Huddlestun has called the $47 million upfront cash payment Hobart is expected to receive as “record-breaking.”
“Hobart secured the largest publicly known upfront cash payment ever for a private development on private land in the country. The developer (Amazon) will pay $47 million in community enhancement payments. These dollars are not part of the levy and not part of any TIF (Tax Increment Finance) district. They go straight to the city and can be used to serve the whole community,” Huddlestun said.
Huddlestun was asked on Wednesday by resident Jessica Gadberry if information will be shared with Hobart citizens on where the $47 million will be used.
She said she had heard through social media that Hobart police officers were going to receive huge raises as a result of the $47 million.
Huddlestun said no to those social media rumors and that everything spent by the city goes through a public process, including the Board of Works approving any raises of city officials.
“We have to get it (the money) first; there’s a process,” Huddlestun said, noting, “We haven’t pinpointed every dollar.”
Huddlestun said the money could be used to purchase in-house equipment, such as for the fire department or address flooding issues or other infrastructure needs.
“We want people to be engaged. The goal is to pass relief onto residents,” Huddlestun said.
City officials in late November announced they were in negotiations with Amazon, the giant online shopping service and data storage and computer services provider, for a data center project.
The city took its first steps at the Dec. 3 City Council meeting toward creating a 725-acre Economic Redevelopment Area that encompasses the two revealed data center project areas and more.
The tax-abatement area includes about 158 acres that were rezoned in 2022 to M-1 at the behest of industrial park developer Becknell Industries.
In addition to the $47 million contribution, the city will receive $10 million when the first building permit is issued and another $45 million when the first building walls go up, Huddestun said previously.
That means in the first year alone, Hobart could receive more than $102 million with building permits, he said.
The developer is also paying 100% of the infrastructure costs.
Deborah Laverty is a freelance reporter for the Post-Tribune.