The Salix City Council voted 3-2 Wednesday to approve a Memorandum of Understanding with Google for a proposed data center on 900 acres of annexed land — a deal where the multinational dictates the terms and holds the purse strings for the town's own impact review.
Under the MOU, Google will reimburse the city for hiring independent advisors to study the data center's effects on the community, capped at $150,000, with invoices paid within 30 days. But there's a catch: if the council imposes a moratorium on data center construction, Google's payments stop immediately. The company gets veto power over the town's most basic regulatory tool — the power to hit pause — by making the funding conditional on the council not using it.
The same 3-2 majority also voted to affirm that no moratorium on data centers exists in Salix, rescinding one if it was
