The story of how the mega AI data campus became an unstoppable inevitability\u2014over the vocal objection of residents who picketed the vote and posted \u201cno data center\u201d signs outside their homes\u2014reveals a broader dynamic of the nationwide AI data center boom: Once projects of this scale are underway, local governments<\/a> often have limited leverage to block them. They are constrained by zoning laws, financial risk, and the realities of negotiating with developers backed by deep-pocketed AI companies, with formidable legal teams and plenty of political clout.<\/p>\n These pressures are only intensifying<\/a> as the AI boom moves from software into physical infrastructure, and demand for computing capacity grows exponentially. The Trump administration has aggressively accelerated US data center construction in its effort to beat China to AI dominance, with a July 2025 executive order streamlining permitting for projects over 100 megawatts or $500 million. Big Tech\u2019s \u201chyperscalers\u201d are projected to invest roughly $630 billion to $700 billion in 2026 in AI-related infrastructure and data-centers, and capital expenditures are expected to reach $5.2 trillion by 2030<\/a>.<\/p>\n Politicians from both sides of the aisle are embracing the build-out, trying to get a piece of the economic development it promises for the communities they represent\u2014including Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, who has been actively courting the hyperscalers building massive data centers since late 2024. At the end of October, Whitmer lauded the Saline Township project, saying the facility expected to create 2,500 union construction jobs, alongside 450 permanent jobs on-site and 1,500 more in the community.<\/p>\n Meanwhile, the rural communities that are increasingly being asked to absorb the environmental<\/a> and economic tradeoffs of these airport-size projects landing in their midst are scrambling to find new avenues of resistance, legal and political.<\/p>\n \u201cI feel like people don\u2019t understand what\u2019s coming,\u201d one resident fighting Saline\u2019s incoming data center in court told Fortune. Kathryn Haushalter, a 42-year-old former U.S. Marine and mother of five who lives in a 200-year-old farmhouse across from the data center site, noted that she has prior construction experience and her husband is in the trades. \u201cWe know what a big project this is, and what a nuisance it\u2019s going to be, and what environmental impact it\u2019s going to have on this area,\u201d she said. \u201cI\u2019m just so nervous for everybody else that doesn\u2019t realize.\u201d<\/p>\n To Barry Lonik, a Michigan-based land preservation consultant with more than three decades of experience, the Saline Township data center project is fundamentally out of place. \u201cNo other industrial project had ever tried to come in here,\u201d he said. \u201cIt\u2019s all farmland.\u201d<\/p>\n But that\u2019s exactly what attracts large-scale data center projects, which require high-voltage transmission lines, as well as hundreds of contiguous acres\u2014something rarely available in urban or industrial sites. Rural areas can offer both the space and access to utilities, Lonik said, and it\u2019s those characteristics that make places like Saline vulnerable.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s a small township\u2014a handful of people on the board, trying to do their jobs,\u201d he told Fortune. \u201cAnd then they get hit with something like this.\u201d<\/p>\n Why \u2018no\u2019 was not enough to stop the data center<\/p>\n Eight months ago, when Saline\u2019s planning commission gathered in the 200-year-old white clapboard township hall to weigh arguments for and against the proposal from Related Digital to rezone 575 acres of farmland for the AI data center, the reasons for rejecting the plan looked straightforward: The land was zoned for agriculture, and much of it was considered prime farmland. The project would introduce industrial noise and environmental stress into a rural landscape and place new demands on emergency responders. It also conflicted with the township\u2019s long-standing master plan, which envisioned development elsewhere.<\/p>\n And the residents the commission represented largely hated the idea of a data center<\/a>, and let that be known with signs and impassioned pleas during the public comments. \u201cIf you polled everyone on the township board, they would have said the same thing: They didn\u2019t want a data center there,\u201d Fred Lucas, the township\u2019s attorney, told Fortune. \u201cWe didn\u2019t invite them, we didn\u2019t encourage them.\u201d<\/p>\n Jim West\u2014UCG\/Universal Images Group\/Getty Images<\/p>\n The commission rejected the plan to rezone the farmland. The township board followed suit, voting 4\u20131 to deny it. But locals quickly discovered that amid the frenzied AI infrastructure gold rush, \u201cno\u201d does not always mean no.<\/p>\n Two days later, on Sept. 12, Saline Township was sued by Related Digital and the site\u2019s landowners. Their lawsuit alleged \u201cexclusionary zoning\u201d\u2014that the community had unreasonably barred a legitimate land use under Michigan law, and it hinged on the fact that Saline Township had no land zoned for industrial use, and that a data center qualified as a \u201cnecessary\u201d use that could not be excluded altogether.<\/p>\n The lawsuit underscored the township\u2019s limited leverage. Even if officials had fought it, their lawyers advised them, the project could likely have moved forward via other avenues, such as partnering with an institution like the nearby University of Michigan, which can build projects that are not subject to local zoning in the same way as private developments. Meanwhile, a prolonged legal battle against well-resourced developers risked significant costs for the township, without securing concessions.<\/p>\n Lucas, the town\u2019s attorney, says the township board had little choice and did its best to be transparent. It was \u201cbetween a rock and a hard place,\u201d he said. \u201cI\u2019m not sure there were any good solutions.\u201d Within weeks, the township had settled: It signed a court-approved agreement allowing the project to proceed, and construction began soon after.<\/p>\n In exchange, the township secured roughly $14 million in community benefits\u2014a relatively small sum in the context of a multibillion-dollar project, but more than 10 times its roughly $1 million annual budget. It includes funding for farmland preservation, local projects, and fire departments; along with a series of environmental and operational limits: restrictions on water use, noise caps, preserved agricultural land, and limits on expansion.<\/p>\n Just seven weeks later OpenAI and Oracle<\/a> would announce the site as part of their global Stargate initiative. And after several months of construction activity, with hundreds of trucks hauling dirt to and from the site, Related Digital said in April that it had secured financing for what is now a $16 billion mega AI data center campus.<\/p>\n Months before Saline saw the proposal, Michigan was courting the AI boom<\/p>\n It wasn\u2019t just money that the Saline Township was up against; it was also months of planning and behind-the-scenes dealmaking, from Lansing to Silicon Valley, that made this massive facility in a quiet farming community all but a foregone conclusion.<\/p>\n Michigan, like other Midwestern states such as Indiana and Ohio, is emerging as a focal point of this AI data center boom, thanks to its combination of available land, access to fresh water, and existing power infrastructure. Developers have identified at least 16 potential data center sites across 10 counties in Michigan\u2019s Lower Peninsula.<\/p>\n An OpenAI spokesperson told Fortune that Governor Whitmer\u2019s office had reached out to the startup in February 2025, following the initial announcement of its Stargate initiative to build AI infrastructure, right after President Trump\u2019s inauguration. She wanted to discuss opportunities for a Stargate site in Michigan.<\/p>\n \u201cThe governor\u2019s team and other stakeholders involved in the project had a series of conversations with OpenAI, including a meeting in the spring between Governor Whitmer and [CEO] Sam Altman,\u201d said the spokesperson, who noted the meeting was virtual and included representatives from Midwestern energy company DTE and Related Digital.<\/p>\n Whitmer\u2019s office declined to comment on what was discussed at the meeting, and there is no evidence that Saline Township was specifically identified. But in the spring of 2025, a Related Digital spokesperson said the company evaluated four potential sites in Michigan with DTE and Detroit-based construction firm Walbridge\u2014including the Saline Township location.<\/p>\n Saline was selected partly for its access to power, and existing transmission lines with the excess capacity to serve a data center, said the Related Digital spokesperson, adding that states like Michigan want to be able to attract these types of projects. \u201cThere was a clear national imperative to keep us competitive,\u201d she said. \u201cThis is a project in support of American technology companies.\u201d<\/p>\n Courtesy of Related Digital<\/p>\n A DTE Energy spokesperson confirmed that it was engaged with Related Digital in the spring of 2025 to help evaluate a site for its potential for connecting to the electrical system. The company will supply roughly 1.4 gigawatts of electricity to the Saline Township site\u2014an amount of power comparable to that of a nuclear plant. (Now, regulators and consumer advocates are pushing back on special contracts between DTE Energy and data center developers, warning they could shift costs onto other ratepayers and strain the grid.)<\/p>\n By May of 2025, still months before the proposal made its way to Saline Township hall, Related Digital had made a deal to purchase the site from three local landowners, descendants of farmers who said they had no intention of farming again. In a letter to a local paper<\/a>, the sellers said that if the site were not used for a data center, they might have sold it to a solar power operator or for large-scale housing, uses that didn\u2019t require a zoning change. Alan Greene, an attorney who represented the landowners, attributed some of the resistance to the project to general anti-AI sentiment. (In addition, the data center builder purchased 475 acres in nearby Bridgewater Township\u2014expected to remain undeveloped.)<\/p>\n Asked by Fortune about her involvement in negotiating the deal for a Stargate site in Michigan, Whitmer\u2019s office released a statement asserting that she welcomes such projects, as long as they\u2019re done in an environmentally responsible way. \u201cGovernor Whitmer has worked very hard to attract new high-tech companies to Michigan in an effort to create good-paying jobs and diversify our economy,\u201d the statement said. \u201cWhether it\u2019s a semiconductor chip fab, AI, or the auto industry, we want to bring jobs and supply chains back home from overseas. At the same time, we also want to make sure that Michigan is only welcoming companies that are going to be good neighbors.\u201d<\/p>\n Residents say the township caved. Officials say they had little choice<\/p>\n The speed of the project\u2019s approval\u2014and the township\u2019s seeming inability to stop it\u2014left residents shocked and angry. Some locals who oppose the project argue that township officials did not do enough to fight it, that they caved too easily. That frustration has now turned into political action: One resident, E. Frederick Gall, has launched a recall effort targeting three members of the township board, including Kelly Marion, the lone official who voted in favor of the proposal. \u201cMy issue is that I don\u2019t think they fought hard enough for us,\u201d Gall said in local reporting. \u201cWe need someone different.\u201d<\/p>\n David Landry, the attorney who represented Saline Township in the Related Digital lawsuit, told Fortune that he stands by his recommendation that the board settle with the developer. \u201cThe zoning power of any municipality\u2014a township, a city, a village\u2014is not absolute,\u201d he explained. \u201cIn this case, exclusionary zoning was substantive\u2014the municipality has to have a reason to say no. They just can\u2019t say, \u2018We don\u2019t want it.\u2019\u201d <\/p>\n Sarah Mills, a professor at the University of Michigan who studies land use planning, agreed that the town had few good options once the lawsuit was filed. \u201cStates determine how much authority local governments have in zoning, and those systems vary widely,\u201d she said. \u201cWhat local governments can do through zoning is highly controlled and regulated by the state.\u201d Local governments are also often strapped for cash, making it difficult to defend against zoning challenges, she added.<\/p>\n Marion, the township clerk and sole board member who voted in favor of the proposal, said this reality was on her mind when she voted yes. It wasn\u2019t because she favored a data center, she said, but because she did not believe the town could win in a showdown with Related Digital. \u201cThey were doing studies,\u201d she said. \u201cThey were pulling permits.\u201d Township attorneys and consultants had warned that a denial could trigger a lawsuit\u2014an outcome Marion said felt intimidating. \u201cEverything was drafted and filed with the county within two days of the meeting,\u201d she said of the lawsuit. \u201cThey had this all prepared.\u201d<\/p>\n If the township had continued to fight and lost the lawsuit, Marion said, homeowners could have been on the hook for tens of thousands of dollars in tax assessments to pay for the legal battle. \u201cThe insurance company was only going to pay for an attorney to defend us up to so much money if we decided to fight it,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n For some residents who oppose the project, the sense of being outmatched extends beyond the township hall or the courtroom. They point to the scale of the companies and powerful people involved\u2014and their perceived connections\u2014as further evidence of the imbalance.<\/p>\n Related Digital\u2019s parent, Related Companies, for example, was founded by billionaire Stephen Ross, an alumnus and major donor to the University of Michigan, whose business school bears his name. And a vice president at Related, Ryan Friedrichs, is married to Michigan Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson, who is running for governor. (Friedrichs said recently he would recuse himself from any projects before the state if Benson is elected governor in 2026.)<\/p>\n Across the road from the bulldozers, one mother keeps fighting<\/p>\n Not everyone in Saline Township accepts that the data center is inevitable. Haushalter, the former U.S. Marine and mother of five, and her husband bought their 60-acre property and renovated the farmhouse on it after she returned from Afghanistan in 2012. She plants about 150 native trees on her property each year, part of an effort to preserve the land for her children, ranging in age from 5 to 13. Now, she\u2019s not sure how long she\u2019ll want to stay. She says she can see the bright lights of the construction site from her bedroom window before sunrise and hear backup alarms from trucks throughout the day. <\/p>\n In December, Haushalter took the unusual step of trying to insert herself into the lawsuit against Saline Township\u2014as a defendant alongside the municipality that had already settled the case. Because she lived close enough to the site to have standing, she sought to challenge the settlement that allowed the data center to move forward. She argued that township officials approved the agreement without doing so properly in a public meeting, as required under Michigan law, and that as a nearby landowner, she should have had an opportunity to weigh in.<\/p>\n \u201cMaybe I\u2019m just stubborn,\u201d she explained. \u201cMaybe it\u2019s because I was a Marine. But this is wrong\u2014and the way it was done is wrong.\u201d<\/p>\n Sharon Goldman<\/p>\n Separately, Haushalter and several other residents filed an appeal with the township\u2019s zoning board, arguing that permits had been issued improperly because the land remains zoned for agriculture. Under Michigan law, such an appeal can trigger an automatic stay on construction until the board makes a final decision. Haushalter said that despite this, residents have not been given a hearing before the zoning board, and construction has continued. Her lawyer, Robert Dube, said Saline Township is trying to get the case dismissed.\u00a0 (Lucas, the township\u2019s lawyer, confirmed this, saying that the Saline Township has filed a motion to dismiss the lawsuit.)<\/p>\n Related Digital has been \u201cmoving dirt\u201d in Saline Township since November, said Joshua LeBaron, another resident involved in the group opposing the project. \u201cI think the plan was to move as fast as possible\u2014so by the time anyone challenged it, they could say it was too far along to stop.\u201d<\/p>\n And indeed, in February a Washtenaw County judge rejected Haushalter\u2019s motion, citing its late timing and the difficulty of undoing a deal already in motion. The judge also pointed to video showing the vote occurred in an open meeting, despite conflicting meeting minutes. A request for reconsideration was denied, and Haushalter is now planning an appeal.<\/p>\n \u201cI feel like I\u2019m playing by a different rule book,\u201d Haushalter said. \u201cLike I\u2019m playing baseball and they\u2019re playing football.\u201d<\/p>\n Haushalter\u2019s dispute centers in part on process. Under Michigan law, rezoning land for industrial use can trigger a public referendum, giving residents a chance to challenge the decision at the ballot box. In this case, critics argue, the township approved the project through a court settlement without formally changing the zoning\u2014effectively sidestepping that part of the process.<\/p>\n During a recent visit by Fortune, Haushalter trudged through her muddy post-rain fields in high rubber boots. Water is one of her biggest concerns, she said: Covering hundreds of acres with buildings and pavement changes how water moves through the land. Rain that once filtered into soil could instead run off into surrounding areas, increasing the risk of flooding and putting pressure on nearby waterways.<\/p>\n And in an area where she and others rely on private wells, with no municipal water system, residents worry that a data center drawing large amounts of groundwater could affect supply over time. Groundwater contamination is another worry that keeps her up at night: \u201cI don\u2019t feel like there\u2019s going to be any warning label,\u201d she said. \u201cIf something gets into the water, you\u2019re not going to know. It\u2019ll just be a surprise.\u201d<\/p>\n Then there\u2019s the question of energy use: As well as the concern that a facility using as much electricity as a small city will drive up residents\u2019 utility bills<\/a>, she pointed out that data centers require a constant power supply, and when outages occur\u2014and they often do in a rural area like Saline Township\u2014backup systems often rely on diesel generators that can run continuously.<\/p>\n \u201cIf the power goes out, they don\u2019t just shut it down,\u201d Haushalter said. \u201cThey bring in generators and run them around the clock. My kids are going to be outside breathing that.\u201d<\/p>\n As three of her children bounced on a nearby trampoline, Haushalter looked across the fallow winter cornfields that she leases out. Trucks hauling dirt and bulldozers and backhoes tearing into the earth were visible across the two-lane road that separates her from the data center site.<\/p>\n She has considered leaving, she said\u2014selling the property and moving somewhere where her family won\u2019t be living in the shadow of a gigantic tech facility. \u201cIt would have been the easiest thing for me to sell my farm and go somewhere so it doesn\u2019t affect me,\u201d she said. \u201cBut would that really benefit my neighbor down the road\u2014the farmer who\u2019s been here for 100 years?\u201d<\/p>\n The companies behind the project say fears about water, noise, and costs are overblown<\/p>\n A spokesperson for Related Digital disputed some characterizations of the Saline Township project, saying there has been \u201cmisinformation\u201d about its impact\u2014particularly around water use, cooling systems, and noise\u2014and noted that the project has drawn support from some nearby residents and local organizations. (Residents retorted that the few supporters are mostly related to the sellers or benefiting financially in some way.)<\/p>\n The spokesperson particularly pushed back on concerns about the project\u2019s water use, saying the facility would rely on a closed-loop cooling system that does not consume large amounts of water. Instead, she said, ongoing water use would be limited to levels comparable to a standard office building. The system would not use evaporative cooling or discharge wastewater through so-called blowdown, she added, and she said the project includes stormwater management improvements designed to better control runoff than current conditions. On a website referring to the Saline Township data center project as \u201cthe Barn\u201d\u2014after a classic red barn on the property\u2014Related Digital also says that the project will pay fully for its energy usage, \u201cwith no costs passed on to Michigan families.\u201d<\/p>\n When reached for comment, an Oracle spokesperson said the company \u201cis committed to being a responsible partner to Saline Township,\u201d and made similar points about its limited water consumption, as well as pointing out that approximately two-thirds of the 1,000-acre campus will be preserved \u201cfor open space, farmland, wetlands, and natural woods.\u201d<\/p>\n With the project underway, residents turn to farmland preservation<\/p>\n Since the Saline project broke ground, county officials in Michigan have begun to respond to area pushback against AI data centers: In Washtenaw County, where Saline Township is located, leaders are calling for more time before additional projects move forward, citing unanswered questions about land use, water, traffic, and long-term community impact. This month, the county\u2019s Board of Commissioners approved a resolution supporting local municipalities considering temporary moratoriums on new data center development.<\/p>\n In Saline Township, that ship has already sailed. At a local council meeting in March that Fortune attended, Haushalter, her husband, and their five children filed into Saline Township Hall, joining a packed room of residents who had spent months protesting the project.<\/p>\n There was a palpable feeling of defeat. Officials offered only brief updates. The project, they said, was moving forward. Questions from the audience focused less on whether the project could be stopped and more on what it would mean in the short term: the steady stream of trucks, the noise, the dust, the strain on local roads.<\/p>\n Outside the meeting, those impacts were already visible. Heavy trucks full of gravel rattled through downtown Saline\u2014the neighboring city distinct from the more rural Saline Township where the project is sited\u2014prompting complaints about speeding, debris, and damage to newly repaved streets. (Related Digital says it has taken steps to address those concerns with traffic regulations and rules for its vehicles. The company also said it briefly paused work to address complaints about mud and debris, adding additional street cleaning and truck washing measures.)<\/p>\n But residents were at the meeting in part because there\u2019s still more land to protect\u2014especially given that data center projects across the nation have tended to balloon in size<\/a> after they get a foothold. That evening\u2019s guest speaker was Lonik, the land preservation consultant, who had been invited to talk about one of the few tools residents still have: conservation easements. Lonik has helped protect thousands of acres by placing legal restrictions on development\u2014an approach some in Saline Township now see as a way to guard against future data center projects.<\/p>\n Over breakfast the next day at a nearby diner, Lonik said that if enough landowners acted together, they could still draw a line\u2014placing restrictions on their property to prevent future industrial development and preserve what remained of the township\u2019s farmland. \u201cThey\u2019re not just NIMBYs,\u201d he told Fortune. \u201cThis is a community that regularly updates its master plan and zoning and decides what it wants to be. And then something like this comes in and just blows everything out of the water.\u201d As for concerns about environmental pollution, plus water and electricity use, Lonik said, \u201cthere\u2019s a lot we still don\u2019t know. But people are right to be asking these questions.\u201d<\/p>\n The Saline project has brought at least one positive outcome. The settlement includes roughly $4 million for farmland preservation\u2014a sum that may seem tiny given the project\u2019s scale, but could help protect open land: some 1,000 acres via preservation agreements such as conservation easements, that might otherwise be lost.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s ironic\u2014[the money] is only there because the data center came in,\u201d said Lonik, who pointed out that until now the township had not moved to preserve its farmland in this way. Still, he admitted that even preservation efforts like conservation easements, while they offer additional hurdles for developers, can\u2019t guarantee more industry won\u2019t come Saline Township\u2019s way. Zoning rules, he said, are temporary, and can be changed by new administrations.<\/p>\n The next AI data center fight<\/p>\n Saline will almost certainly not be the last Michigan AI data center. Across southeast Michigan, similar projects are already in motion: Anthropic is the intended end user of a proposed hyperscale data center in Lyon Township, an hour northeast of Saline Township, while Google<\/a> is considering a one-gigawatt campus in Van Buren Township, near the Detroit airport.<\/p>\n Resident Joshua LeBaron said that he and the rest of the opposition group know that their options to fight data centers have become very limited. \u201cAn AI stock market crash is probably the only thing that could stop it now\u2014which is not out of the realm of possibility,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n For Haushalter, that possibility is cold comfort as she watches the development rise and continues to appeal her case. She wishes more people were paying attention.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s a very complicated situation and a lot to take in,\u201d she said. \u201cI\u2019ve had to learn more about ordinances and state law and zoning than I ever thought I would want to. But now I realize how important these nitty-gritty, seemingly boring things really are. They can upend your whole community.\u201d<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ai\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/GettyImages-2249621645-e1777579271687.jpg\"\/)
In December of 2025, Michigan residents rallied against a Stargate data center project that they say was fast-tracked with little transparency.<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ai\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/Related-Digital-data-center-campus-in-Saline-Township-MI_construction-photo-1_courtesy-of-Related-Di.jpeg\"\/)
The $16 billion data center project in progress.<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ai\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/Kathryn-Haushalter_1000028739-1-e1777579073322.jpg\"\/)
Kathryn Haushalter is fighting the data center project across from her cornfields in court. <\/p>\n