Plan commission approves new Kenosha data center

The city of Kenosha’s plan commission unanimously approved plans to annex and rezone land for a new data center on Thursday.

Pending council approval, the city will annex land northwest of the intersection of I-94 and State Highway 142 from the Town of Paris. The land would be rezoned to manufacturing, allowing the large data center complex to go up.

That property is part of a boundary agreement between the Town of Paris and Kenosha.

A nondisclosure agreement between the city and company operating the center is, for now, keeping that company’s identity anonymous.

But it’s known that the data center will consist of four 250,000-square-foot buildings and a new electric substation. It will have entrances on Highway 142 and County Road MB.

“Our client is someone who designs, develops, owns and operates, so they have a long-term vested interest in staying here and employing folks here through these data centers for decades to come,” said Danielle Tatro, a civil engineer from Colorado who represented the company at the meeting.

She said each building will have a few dozen technical and security staff, whose jobs will include benefits and pay between $80,000 and $100,000.

She also said the company will conduct two traffic impact analyses, including construction and operational traffic. The construction site’s entrance will be on County Road MB.

The data center will be cooled by air, not water. Kenosha will connect the center to its sewer and water system.

Tatro also noted the presence of large, old trees on the site. She said “we’re leaving those in place as much as we can,” adding that they could help screen the data center from the surrounding roads.

Kenosha Mayor David Bogdala called the development a “game changer.” Alder Rocco LaMacchia said job creation helps “keep [young people] in the city so the city can keep growing.”

The data center will be 6 miles south of Microsoft’s under-construction $3.3 billion campus in Mount Pleasant. It will be joining large Amazon and Uline warehouses, as well as the Mars Cheese Castle, at the intersection of Highway 142 and I-94.