Texas is booming with data center ambitions — but not everyone wants to foot the bill. Two major proposals are now drawing sharp scrutiny from local governments and residents alike, raising fundamental questions about who really benefits when billion-dollar tech infrastructure lands in a community’s backyard.
In Guadalupe County, commissioners voted 3-2 on Feb. 24 to reject a $500 million property tax abatement that would have supported a multibuilding data center campus proposed by CloudBurst Texas in New Braunfels. The vote wasn’t even close in spirit — three commissioners drew a line, and it held. The deal is dead, at least for now.
Meanwhile, just up the highway in Fort Worth, a similar fight is unfolding in slow motion. Edged Data Centers, a subsidiary of Endeavour, wants to build a $1.1 billion data center complex on 186 acres in the Veale Ranch area near Interstate 20 and Chapin School Road — deep in west Fort Worth’s expanding suburban corridor. The city is weighing a tax break agreement for the developers, and a council vote had been expected around March 31.
Residents Push Back
That’s the catch. It’s not just elected officials asking hard questions this time — it’s the neighbors. Fort Worth residents near the proposed site have been raising concerns about what a sprawling industrial data campus would mean for their community: noise, traffic, power consumption, water use, and whether the tax incentives truly justify the trade-offs. These aren’t abstract policy debates. For people living close to I-20 and Chapin School Road, this is about what their neighborhood looks like in ten years.
Still, Fort Worth’s city leadership hasn’t slammed the door. The tax break negotiations are ongoing, and the $1.1 billion investment figure is exactly the kind of number that tends to keep conversations alive in city halls. The Star-Telegram noted the city is actively considering the abatement agreement — suggesting there’s political appetite to make some version of this deal work, even if the details remain contested.
The Bigger Picture
So why does any of this matter beyond local zoning fights? Because Texas has become one of the most sought-after states in the country for data center development — driven by cheap land, a deregulated energy grid, and a business-friendly tax environment. But that last part is increasingly up for debate. The Guadalupe County vote is a signal, however small, that the era of rubber-stamping massive tax abatements for tech infrastructure may be losing some of its reflexive political support.
Data centers bring jobs — some of them, anyway. They generate tax revenue, eventually. But they also consume enormous amounts of electricity and water, and they don’t exactly fill a community with the kind of economic activity that ripples outward into local restaurants and shops. The math isn’t always as clean as the press releases suggest.
How much is too much to give away? That’s essentially what commissioners in Guadalupe County decided they weren’t willing to find out. Whether Fort Worth reaches the same conclusion — or signs on the dotted line — could say a lot about the direction Texas cities are heading as the data center gold rush accelerates.
For now, the proposed Edged site sits on 186 acres of west Fort Worth land, waiting. The council vote looms. And somewhere in New Braunfels, CloudBurst Texas is presumably rethinking its next move. The boom isn’t over — but it’s getting more complicated.
