The Sanford City Council voted unanimously on Tuesday night to extend an emergency moratorium on data centers for 180 days.
With the extension, the moratorium will expire on Jan. 31.
The new moratorium overrides an initial 91-day emergency moratorium that would have ended on Aug. 18, despite a misprint in the ordinance included in a city agenda packet that said the expiration was Aug. 12.
The moratoriums halted a proposed data center pitched as part of the Sanford Woods Industrial and Technical Campus, which developers have said would cover more than 1,000 acres near the Mousam River.
That project in part prompted the citizen-proposed moratorium, which was designed to provide time for the city to establish guardrails to protect the community from potential negative impacts of large-scale data centers.
In June, the City Council appointed the members of the new Industrial Development Standards Task Force, which was established to survey existing municipal standards and propose amendments, as well as new possible ordinances.
Mayor Becky Brink said Tuesday the task force would be “going into all of our ordinances that already exist and saying, ‘Do we need more, and if we do, let’s create them.’”
The task force includes Deputy Mayor Maura Herlihy; City Councilor Cheeny Plante; representatives from the city planning board, water district, sewerage district and Industrial Development Corporation; and four Sanford-Springvale residents: Steven Benotti, Alexander Clary, Joe Gorsun and Don Jamison.
Clary, who is running for City Council, said he’s seen a “resounding opposition” to the proposed project in Sanford.
Sanford is one of many municipalities in Maine and nationwide taking precautions against unregulated, large-scale data centers. Some have responded to proposed projects, while others are proactively strengthening ordinances as data centers pop up across the country. In April, Gov. Janet Mills vetoed a bill that would have made Maine the first state to enact a temporary ban on new data centers.
When the proposed data center at the Sanford Woods campus was announced in February, it sparked debate among residents about possible negative impacts.
Rebecca Andrews, a Springvale resident, said she understands the need for industrial developments but warned about pollution and community impact.
“We need to be thoughtful about what kinds of industry will bring the most benefits and stability to our community,” she said. “Much like when Sanford was dependent heavily on mills, when they closed, it took us decades to recover.”
Randy Gibbs, the primary developer behind the Sanford Woods project, said in May that he supported a moratorium.
“We intend to develop Sanford Woods responsibly,” he wrote in a letter to the council that was read aloud prior to the initial moratorium vote. “We would rather meet a high bar than operate in an undefined one.”
Gibbs said Wednesday that the task force seemed to be on track to provide those additional guardrails.
Brink, the mayor, said the task force’s goal is to work through to the end of January, when the new moratorium expires. Herlihy, the deputy mayor, said if the work is not completed by then, the moratorium could be extended for another 180 days.