A small group of demonstrators and candidates for state office gathered in Wilkes-Barre on Saturday urging friends and neighbors to keep showing up in their communities and questioning data center proposals in the region.
"We are the neighbors of all these places. We suffer downstream. We suffer upstream. We all breathe the same air. We all pay the same energy costs,” Annette Miraglia said.
Miraglia, a Kingston resident, organized the protest as part of a national day of No Data Center Protests, organized by HumansFirst.
About a dozen people stood under the roof of the amphitheater on Public Square as a steady rain beat down.
There are more than 20 proposals for large-scale data center campuses in Northeast and Northcentral Pennsylvania.
Residents across the region have said they worry about how the industry will impact their utilities, quality of life and more. They have been showing up to municipal meetings to learn about the proposals and oppose them.
'Top to the bottom'
Christine Fazzi lives in Bear Creek Twp. She said residents like herself have been trying to help their local government put a stop to data centers coming into their community.
Fazzi said everything about the data center industry makes her worried.
"From the top to the bottom. I mean, the way money is more important than people or lives or animals or nature, how things will be changed and we will not have a say," she said.
Township residents live off wells, Fazzi said. They’re concerned about how a data center campus would impact their water.
"And this would be a big problem with our water system and our air, and the sound and animals and everything else,” she said.
Todd Eachus, a former Pennsylvania House majority leader, recently was arrested at a meeting in Kline Twp. in Schuylkill County. He lives in Butler Twp., about 6 miles from Kline, in an Emergency Planning Zone (EPZ) for the Susquehanna Steam Electric Station nuclear power plant.
He wants to use his expertise from living in the EPZ to help his neighbors from surrounding municipalities.
"These folks are trying to divide us … in some way where one neighbor can't speak to another neighbor, one borough can't speak to a township,” he said of the industry.
Political candidates vs. data centers
Among the protesters were Democratic candidates running for state House and Senate seats.
Fern Leard is running for the 120th House District, a seat currently occupied by Republican Brenda Pugh.
"We are here because we care deeply about our communities. This is our home. This is not a testing ground,” she said.
Leard said the industry could change the entire character of communities and put pressure on utlities.
"While the companies behind them answer to shareholders, not the families who have to spend who have spent generations building their lives here,” she said.
Jeremy Benscoter is running for state representative for the 117th House District. He will face current Rep. Jamie Walsh, a Republican, who is against data center development.
Benscoter said part of the reason he decided to run was because of the proliferation of data center proposals in the area.
"Data center development does not have our interest at heart," he said.
He said there is a lack of urgency in Harrisburg.
"It's been over a year that they've started to come into our area, and yet we're just now seeing legislation being introduced to protect communities," he said.
Walsh, his opponent, has introduced a series of legislation on data centers since May.
Benscoter wants communities to be able to outright deny large-scale data center developments and other developments that require large properties and don’t benefit the community.
Jackie Baker is running for state Senate District 20, hoping to oust longtime Republican Sen. Lisa Baker, who is of no relation.
"There are giant, multi-billion-dollar tech companies trying to move into our neighborhoods. They're looking at Pennsylvania, not as a partner, but as a resource to be harvested," she said.
Baker said strict laws are needed from Harrisburg to protect communities.
"We need to make sure that our local government, our state government, our municipalities, and our boroughs are well prepared so that they can have the absolute power to say no to a data center that might interfere with their zoning plans, or it might destroy their neighborhoods," she said.
Tony Dastra, the Green Party of Pennsylvania candidate for governor, also spoke, with a "No Data Center" pin stuck to the lapel of his dark green suit.
Other protests were held around the region, including in Danville.
"We are not here to make corporations comfortable," Leard said. "We are here to make sure our children inherit communities that are still worth calling home, because our future is not for sale, our voices are not for sale, and we are not backing down."
