INDIANAPOLIS — Opposition is growing to a proposed data center in Indy's Martindale-Brightwood neighborhood, where faith leaders and residents say the project would bring few benefits and add environmental risk to an already burdened community.
Members of the Black Church Coalition met Tuesday on the city’s east side to discuss next steps in their push against a planned 70-foot-tall data center on a long-vacant lot near East 25th Street and North Sherman Drive.
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Coalition leaders said they are not opposed to development but believe the proposed project fails to address the community’s most pressing needs.
The data center would be built by California-based MetroBloks. The project site is currently zoned for industrial use.
Rev. Fitzhugh Lyons Jr., chairman of the newly formed Martindale-Brightwood People Action Coalition, said the facility would not provide long-term employment or environmental stability for residents.
“The main thing that we’re focusing on is what this data center will not bring to this community,” Lyons said. “It will not bring jobs, it will not bring environmental stability, and it will bring outside businesses that are not really geared toward the benefit of the Brightwood community.”
Lyons and other coalition members said the neighborhood would benefit more from banks, grocery stores, pharmacies, healthcare facilities and urgent care centers, services they say are lacking in the area.
Environmental concerns were also a major topic during the meeting, echoing issues raised at previous community forums.
“It threatens environmental justice efforts in a community already overburdened by pollution, health disparities and legacy contamination,” Lyons Jr. said.
MetroBloks said it is aware of the concerns and emphasized that the proposed facility would be smaller in scale than traditional data centers.
In a statement, the company said:
For pollution, the backup generators are state-of-the-art (Tier-IV generators with catalytic converters) and produce less pollution than a school bus. These will also be encased with noise attenuation to ensure noise is kept at a minimum.
The company also told WRTV it would assume all utility costs associated with the data center and that residents would not pay subsidies for the project.
Lyons said community members feel they have not been adequately included in the planning process.
“I understand what’s being said, but we feel like transparency has not been there,” he said. “The community hasn’t been given an opportunity to listen and to hear. It feels like, ‘This is what we’re going to do, and you’re going to like it.’"
Councilor for District 8 Ron Gibson, who was in attendance for one of the previous meetings, previously shared with WRTV that he supports the data center proposal.
MetroBloks is scheduled to appear before a city hearing examiner at 1 p.m. Wednesday at the City-County Building, where the project will be reviewed during a public meeting.
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