Menomonie Mayor Randy Knaack defended his move to halt city support for a proposed $1.6 billion data center.
Knaack told WPR’s “Wisconsin Today” that he made the decision to draft a letter to Balloonist, LLC, the company pursuing the center, saying the city is not interested in negotiating incentives for the project.
“When the data center (representatives) give their sales pitch, it’s a pretty good sales pitch, we can do this and we can do that,” he said. “It sounds really good on the surface. But when you start digging deeper into it, at what cost to the community?
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“I think that’s the biggest concern of residents. There are some good things that can come from a data center, but at what cost to the community?”
Knaack previously said the data center would add $1.7 million in tax revenue every year for the city, and Menomonie has already annexed a parcel of land for the project. At a city council meeting on Monday, one member attempted to bring a vote of “no confidence” against the mayor.
On “Wisconsin Today,” Knaack talked about his relationship with the city council, data center concerns and project plans moving forward.
The following interview was edited for brevity and clarity.
Kate Archer Kent: On what authority as mayor are you able to put the project on hold?
Randy Knaack: As chief executive officer of the city, I have the determining factor of what is good or indifferent or bad for the city.
I do praise my city council though. I have an amazing group of city council members. They were involved in the same sales pitch that I listened to. And when you hear the sales pitch from the data center representatives, it’s really good. But when you hear the other side coming back from the community, is it as good as it appears? Maybe we should take a step back and get a fresh look at this.
That being said, I offered a pause on this. I don’t know if it’s a long pause or a short pause, or if it’ll go away or what will really happen. But I did have the ability, and I don’t hold anything against any of our city council members or the people selling the land.
I think everybody is open to their own opinion. We all try to do the very best we can with the information we have at hand.
KAK: Some residents have opposed the secretive nature of the project, not knowing the tech company involved, the nondisclosure agreements, and working through a shell company. Is that lack of visibility a valid concern?
RK: The general public, unless they’re paying attention with the postings and newspapers, they don’t always hear about what’s happening at City Hall, which is unfortunate. … Basically, NDRs and NDAs and things of that nature are pretty common business for cities and general business as it is.
But there is a concern that more of the community members wanted to know more about this data center. And we are trying to be as forthright as possible to let the community know what’s going on at City Hall.
KAK: Do you think the people behind the data center proposal will walk away from this or will they come back with a different offer?
RK: I’m not 100 percent sure. The ball is in their park at this time. As the mayor, I thought it was best to listen to the community.
