Communities all over Kentucky are fighting to try to stop data centers from entering their area.
While data centers of all sorts have existed for years, in the past decade we’ve seen a rise of extremely power hungry data centers that generate all sorts of pollution, suck down enormous amounts of power and water, and put the health, safety, and economic wellbeing of communities at risk.
When a shadowy shell corporation came to Oldham County looking to build a data center, residents there were caught off guard. While their County Judge Executive and Magistrates worked in secret to lure the data center, residents were looking for ways to stop the development of the data centers, to at least give the community time to put reasonable controls and developmental safeguards in place.
Oldham eventually won the battle, but other communities in Kentucky now find themselves fighting the same uncertainty.
So how did we get here?
2024’s House Bill 8 - Sponsored by Jason Petrie, Steven Rudy, and Josh Bray
It starts with HB 8 in 2024. This was an innocuous looking 11 page bill about fiscal matters from rural Kentucky representatives Jason Petrie, Steven Rudy, and Josh Bray. It contains no mention of data centers.
After spending time in the House Appropriations and Revenue Committee, it passes committee on 3/14/24. It is now 124 pages. No mention of data centers appears in the new draft. It passes the House on 3/15/24 and moves to the Senate.
On 3/25/24 it passes the Senate with Senate Committee Substitute 1. It is 167 pages. There is no mention of data centers.
The House does not concur with the Senate Committee Substitute that was passed on 3/25/24. A Free Conference Committee is established on 3/28/24 to work on a compromise bill. 3/28/25 is the LAST day of the session before the veto period.
The bill reaches the hands of the Senate at 7:10 PM on that last day. It is now 198 pages long and finally contains data center tax breaks that apply only to urban areas. There is barely any time for anyone to read or digest the bill before voting on it, but it does contain items important to most everyone. It passes at 7:14 PM.
The House receives the bill at 9:12 PM that evening. It is passed after minimal debate at 9:16.
So now we have the first step in opening up all 120 counties to data centers tax breaks and an influx of people wishing to use them.
2025’s House Bill 775 - Sponsored by Jason Nemes
Since it worked so well the first time, why not do it again?
Jason Nemes introduced HB 775 as a 4 page placeholder on 2/19/25. There was no mention of data center tax breaks.
On 2/27/25, it left committee with a substitute bill, also 4 pages long. There was no mention of data center tax breaks.
On 3/11/25, it passed the House with a committee substitute bill. That bill was now 108 pages long. Again, no mention of data center tax breaks.
On 3/14/25, which is the last day of the 2025 session before the veto period, HB 775 passes in the Senate with yet another substitute bill. That bill is 147 pages. Tucked away on page 138 and 139 of that bill are language which now extends data center tax breaks to all 120 counties in Kentucky. It is passed at 5:34 PM that last day of the session before the veto period. This version reaches the house and is passed there at 9:28 PM, as another lengthy and exhausting session comes to a close.
Legislative legerdemain
All four sponsors of these two bills are seasoned veterans of Frankfort. Since a supermajority controls Frankfort, it’s easy to play games with bills, control when they hit the calendar, and create an environment in which small language that creates big issues can big ignored.
The sponsors of HB 8 laid the groundwork for this bill. Most people in Frankfort don’t care what happens in Louisville, and in the supposed Democratic stronghold, you can rest assured that any sort of polluting monstrosity of a data center will be placed in the poorest and most disadvantaged areas of the county where pollution is already a problem. Per the Kentucky Registry of Election Finance, representatives Petrie, Rudy, and Bray all have taken campaign money from electric power PACs, and a quid pro quo you can hide in plain sight is the best quid pro quo. Petrie, Rudy, and Bray knew they were safe from outrage in their counties with this bill.
HB 775 was the risky one. Jason Nemes, who also has taken money from electric power PACs, may have assumed from lack of reaction to HB 8 that HB 775’s last minute data center tax break extensions wouldn’t draw notice. Perhaps he and his fellow Republicans from Oldham County who have received electric PAC money underestimated the amount of pushback that they’d receive there. He and Oldham County’s David Osborne seemed to want to stay out of any serious comment for or against data centers. I suppose they figured if they kept their names out of it, their ties to big electric and the bill itself would simply go away.
Sadly, this is the way things are run in Frankfort. While tons of legislative, community, and media energy is burned on ridiculous culture war issues, there are plenty of more boring bills that are sneaking under the radar by design. While the entire state stews on non-issues like transgender middle schoolers playing field hockey or using a bathroom that makes former marines uncomfortable, other bills are quietly being pushed through that lower our standard of living, give generous gifts to corporations, allow for more pollution of our environment, and take away benefits and resources that give Kentuckians a better quality of life.
Our legislature does most of its business in secret. Bills are hashed out in secret and often hit committee or the floor before the legislators or the public get a chance to see them. This is by design. Kentucky’s Republicans don’t want anyone to see what they’re doing before they do it. The less time opponents have to read and speak out about bad language in bills, the easier it is to get them through.
As I finished this, Democratic Representative Tina Bojanowski posted the item below on her Substack. Twelve bills were on the agenda for the A&R committee. It looks like those bills amount to a rough draft of War and Peace. Tina’s a sharp cookie, but I’m guessing even she won’t be able to digest all of those pages in the time she has before they come before the get to the house.
This lack of transparency and forcing through legislation used to be considered bad government by many Republicans. Now it’s just simply a power move to do whatever they want without reprisal.
It’s why we need to start voting them out and start restoring sanity to Frankfort.
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Written by Rob Mattheu. Cross-posted from Blunder Over Louisville. Go there to subscribe!
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