Coweta residents are pushing back on a proposed data center, with visible local organizing and frustration over being kept in the dark.
The city signed what appears to be its first-ever NDA on this project, about 18 months before residents learned of it, which is driving distrust around the developer and officials.
Neither the developer nor city officials attended the community meeting, reinforcing concerns that local input is being sidelined in siting decisions.
State Rep. Mandy Clinton is zeroing in on core infra issues: water usage, power demand, and how hyperscale data centers will affect grid capacity.
She expects electricity rates to rise if Oklahoma keeps adding large-load data center customers, aligning with patterns in other states.
Clinton plans legislation to force a statewide directory of data centers, including location and power consumption, which would give operators, regulators, and communities a clearer view of cumulative load.
The story is a good snapshot of how local politics, power costs, and transparency are becoming gating factors for data center and AI build-out.
