1,000 signatures reached
To: Harley Pothoff - Board of Supervisors - Chair
Say No to Dubuque Area Data Center
Dubuque county farmers that own approximately 425 acres south of Dubuque have been approached and agreed to selling their land for a data center. This land in question is along Old Davenport Rd. between Feeney Rd. and Laudeville Rd. We need to stop this from happening to protect our community and farmland.
Dubuque county has the privilege of sitting in a very unique region. Not only is the farmland full of rich soil, we are a part of the Driftless Area. This area should be protected from the destruction that data centers cause around them. Please see the devastation it has caused across the country and specifically in this clip to a Georgia community. They no longer have access to clean water. They can't even flush their toilets because the impact the data center had on their water.
We need to prohibit the rezoning of our farmland to build an environment destroying data center.
Why is this important?
The land in question is along Old Davenport Rd. between Feeney Rd. and Laudeville Rd. We need to stop this from happening to protect our community and farmland. Allowing a data center to be built in our farming community will be devastating. Iowa is already experiencing high nitrates in water, and high cancer rates. A data center would only add to those issues for the local community. World Resource Institute found that data centers release harmful air pollutants including fine particulate matter and nitrogen oxides. These are linked to respiratory disease, heart disease, asthma, and other serious health risks.
Communities surrounding a data center in Virginia have reported health issues related to the noise. Residents have reported headaches, sleep disruptions, and lower quality of life.
But, the impacts don’t stop there. The University of Michigan Ford School of Science, Technology, and Public Policy published a paper in July 2025 reviewing the impact data centers have had on communities. They found data centers use the equivalent of power used by 2000 homes and millions of gallons of water annually.
According to the paper, Google’s Council Bluffs data center uses around 980 million gallons of water per year. This is equivalent to the average usage of over 4 million homes.
Michigan residents are experiencing energy rate increases of 25% since the construction of the Switch Data Center in 2017 and their rates are now 17% higher than national average. In 2025, the US saw over $60 billion worth of rate increases countrywide, according to World Resources Institute.
University of Michigan also found that the tax breaks do not deliver the promised economic benefits and they reduce local tax revenues, while shifting financial burden onto communities and schools.
University of Michigan also found that the tax breaks do not deliver the promised economic benefits and they reduce local tax revenues, while shifting financial burden onto communities and schools.
These impacts will not only affect the farming community south of town, it will affect about half of the city. According to Andrea Marinoni, associate professor with the Earth Observation Group at the University of Cambridge, data centers temperature increases were affecting areas as far as 6.2 miles away.