A group of residents gathered outside the Tippecanoe County Courthouse Monday morning ahead of a public hearing on the Purdue Research Foundation’s request to rezone about 121 acres north of Kalberer Road, between Yeager Road and County Road 50 West/Salisbury Street, from residential to industrial for SK hynix’s preferred West Lafayette site.
The South Korean chipmaker announced in 2024 that it planned to invest close to $4 billion in an advanced packaging fabrication and R&D facility for AI products in Purdue Research Park.
Among those speaking at the protest was Purdue graduate and longtime resident Helen DeMarco, who described herself as a spokesperson for the group.
“We’re here today to support the hearing that’s gonna be happening in a little bit,” DeMarco said, arguing the proposed facility would place heavy industry too close to residential neighborhoods.
Purdue graduate and longtime resident Helen DeMarco holds a sign while speaking with another attendee of Monday’s protest against SK hynix at the Tippecanoe County Courthouse.
Andrew Coleman | Photo & Video Editor
DeMarco said residents are worried about potential air and water impacts from industrial processes and about the project’s proximity to homes, a senior living community, and local community facilities.
DeMarco said her opposition is not to the semiconductor industry itself, but to the chosen location.
“I know that there’s a need for us to have this industry,” she said. “They need to put it in a place where it can be operated as safely as possible. And this does not feel as safe as possible.”
She also pushed back on the argument that West Lafayette must accept the project or risk losing it to another state.
“I’m not concerned about what other states are doing,” DeMarco said. “I’m concerned about what we’re doing in Indiana.”
DeMarco said she was especially frustrated by what she sees as Purdue’s role in backing the project. She also said the debate has made her question the university’s commitment to the community surrounding it.
“For me, it just shows, I think, how far Purdue has fallen in terms of commitment to the communities that support them,” she said.
Charles Bouman, another protestor and a Purdue professor of electrical and computer engineering, said the issue is not whether SK hynix should expand in Indiana, but whether this site makes sense for the company or the community.
Electrical and Computer Engineering Professor Charles Bouman poses with a sign during Monday’s protest against SK hynix at the Tippecanoe County Courthouse.
Andrew Coleman | Photo & Video Editor
“We’re trying to stop the construction of a huge factory in the middle of a college town community,” Bouman said. “There’s so many places a company like that could locate that would be more effective, and better for them, better for SK hynix.”
Bouman argued that city leaders had not produced enough evidence to justify claims about the project’s benefits.
“I think it’s absolutely outrageous that there has been no study at all on the economic impact of this factory, on the environmental impact of this factory, on the site location of this factory,” he said.
He also said the project could reshape housing patterns around Purdue and further strain an already tight market in West Lafayette. Bouman said younger faculty members are already reluctant to buy homes near the proposed site.
“This is bad for Purdue University. This is bad for SK hynix, and this is bad for the community,” Bouman said. “So the question that comes to my mind is, ‘Who is it good for?’”
The protest came as Purdue and state leaders continue to pitch semiconductors as central to Indiana’s economic future. Purdue has publicly tied the SK hynix project to its broader semiconductor strategy and to a “Tech Corridor” linking West Lafayette and Indianapolis in a recent interview with AMD CEO Lisa Su.
But for residents at the protest, the message was less about rejecting growth than demanding a different version of it.
DeMarco and Bouman said Indiana can pursue high-tech investment without placing a large industrial facility next to established neighborhoods — Bouman said that is why residents need to keep showing up.
“They need to come out to these sorts of protests,” he said, “so that they can make it clear to our elected officials … that the community does not want this.”
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