Dover-Foxcroft is the latest town in rural Maine that may pass a ban on building large-scale data centers as backlash against big tech sweeps the state.
Developers are unlikely to build such a project in the town, which has limited infrastructure and ordinances already on the books to regulate development. But with support from a statewide environmental group, the rural community’s select board is on track to pass a six-month ban on large-scale data center development by the end of September.
It’s another in a string of small, conservative towns backing temporary bans of data centers, a movement that sprouted up on the left but has quickly become more bipartisan.
Maine has few data centers, the warehouse-like facilities that provide computing power for a variety of uses, including AI. News stories from away have Mainers concerned that such centers may crop up and use significant amounts of water and electricity, driving up utility prices. Since Gov. Janet Mills vetoed legislation that would have created a statewide moratorium on some new data center projects this spring, towns are taking up the issue themselves.
Dover-Foxcroft is no exception. Select Board Chair Stephen Grammont said despite the low odds of a data center being built in town, jitters about the projects are “not a make-believe concern.”
“We’re not high up on the mega data center list of places to locate,” Grammont said. “I think what’s concerned a lot of people is that there have been some surprises.”
It wouldn’t be the first Maine town to be surprised by plans for a data center; officials in Jay only found out about a proposed project after the plan was well underway and reported on by the Bangor Daily News.
Dover-Foxcroft’s proposed ban was pushed in part by Carole Boothroyd, chair of the town’s Climate Action Advisory Committee and wife of a Democratic candidate for state legislature. Boothroyd sought and received advice from Maine Conservation Voters, an environmental group, as she drafted the proposed ordinance.
The group worked closely with legislators during the last session to pass the statewide moratorium that Mills ultimately vetoed in the spring. As towns began weighing moratoriums this summer, the group posted on its social media accounts asking local officials to contact them if they needed advice drafting policy.
“We were very, very disappointed by the governor’s veto of that bill, because we know that we need time to understand the impacts of these large-scale data centers,” Maggie Somers, the group’s outreach director, said. “That’s really when this got kicked into high gear, and I started working closely with these communities to see how we could help.”
Boothroyd and Somers said Dover-Foxcroft’s proposed ban, which could be extended beyond six months, is meant to give the town cover while the state’s Data Center Advisory Council studies ways to regulate the projects, a process Maine Conservation Voters is involved in.
“We’re already gearing up for this next [legislative] session and making sure that we have legislation prepared,” Somers said.
Whatever bills on data centers are passed will not have to go through Mills, who is retiring. Those running to replace her, Republican Bobby Charles, Democrat Hannah Pingree and Independent Rick Bennett, have all said they would sign data center moratoriums.
In Dover-Foxcroft, Grammont says it isn’t just Boothroyd and the conservationists who are supportive of a local ban.
“I think it’s across the board,” he said. “We want to make sure that we, the town’s people, don’t get screwed.”
Daniel O’Connor is a Report for America corps member who covers rural government as part of the partnership between the Bangor Daily News and The Maine Monitor, with additional support from BDN and Monitor readers.