"Throw the damn towel...."

I feel like a rogue stenographer who is allowed to cut corners (and use profanity). I offer these day-after missives as a public service to those who cannot attend these meetings.

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The data center fight goes on. Yet another Wildcat Ridge hearing last night, and despite the sheer tedium of these things, the crowds have not diminished. In fact, last night’s hearing was the most crowded I’ve seen. It featured a Harvard educated expert on the health effects of hyperscale data centers. Such credentials do not come cheap. On cross examination he divulged that he was paid $10,000 to put his report together. I’m in the wrong line of work, Bubba.

I try to stay updated on these things. Seemingly every meeting is touted as one in which residents can step up and speak, but for whatever procedural reason that never happens. There is yet another hearing scheduled on this later this month. And so it goes…..a never-ending cavalcade of experts and lawyers droning on about OUR future, while we sit and grumble. One must grumble in silence, mind you. Erupt and you will be given a red card and an escort to the door. At times it feels like “decorum” is given more weight than the health risks associated with these fucking things, but that could just be me running out of patience.

I don’t mean this as a swipe at council. They are doing a job that none of us want. I’m sure they are every bit as pissed off as the rest of us. I admire their restraint and professionalism. Data Center lawyers expected pliable rubes. What they’ve found instead is a steely jury of their peers.

Anyway, I’ll try to cut through all the technical jargon and narrow down the guy’s testimony.

These types of data centers will surely make some of us sick, and may actually kill a few others while they rumble along. The number of potential ailments runs into the dozens. In his expert opinion the only way to ensure that our health will not be negatively impacted is to not build them at all.

I could have told you this and charged a lot less money, but one wishes to cross Ts and dot Is, so credibility is important. Plus, I didn’t go to Harvard.

Data center lawyers were allowed to cross-examine. The usual suspect, an insufferably arrogant male attorney (when you attend all these meetings, you get to know the actors), stepped aside and a fresh lawyer took over. She admitted right off the top that she’d only had a few hours to study the report. Letting the entire room know you are not prepared is presumably not the sort of thing one learns in law school, but it did elicit all sorts of jeers and hoots from the crowd. She attempted to compare hyperscale data center generators to hospitals and school buses, and at one point objected to the “relevance” of a question concerning our health and safety. She asked the witness if he used Facebook and Instagram, insinuating that anybody who does has forfeited the right to oppose data centers. I use electricity too, but that doesn’t mean I’m gonna allow a substation in my fucking living room.

I actually felt badly for her, and can only assume that the lead attorney decided to teach her how to swim by throwing her off the diving board. When she finally said “no more questions” it was like being saved by the bell before the referee had to step in. We all collectively exhaled.

One of the most extraordinary things about these hearings is the almost contemptuous lack of preparation by the Developer’s legal team, as if they just assumed we’d be assuaged by fancy suits and a few power point presentations. Their work has been shoddy, lazy, and often devoid of much needed context. Last night they assumed they had won some sort of cheap rhetorical point when forcing the witness to divulge what he was paid, but merely served to underscore their own mercenary instincts. They seem to lack ANY self-awareness.

It might have been at this precise point in the proceedings that a guy in the crowd had had enough, and erupted like Mount Vesuvius. Asked to leave, he muttered curses the entire way up the aisle, and if I wasn’t afraid he might have killed me I would have hugged him. His outburst was what we all wanted to say, but didn’t. It was a collective “Fuck You” to this entire absurd situation. The man should never have to buy a drink in this town again.

There were 4 Archbald police cruisers there last night. I’m not sure what they are expecting. Rioting? Looting? A teen flash-mob? Other than some well deserved jeering, the town has behaved with incredible restraint and class, all things considered. When chastised by the borough solicitor, we meekly disengage. If I were on council I might spend half the night banging my head audibly off the table. Alas, our members have maintained their composure. They are better than me. And I’m grateful for that.

In other words, the town has not taken the bait. Our opposition has stayed within the guardrails. It is possible to fight cleanly, even when your opponent hits below the belt.

Once again, I was immensely proud of my hometown. And the better angels of her nature.

In a bit…

—tf