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Logan County Board
Logan County Board Votes Down Data Center Ordinance
[June 19, 2026]
On Thursday, June 18th, the
Logan County Board held their regular meeting in the third-floor
courtroom of the Logan County Courthouse starting at 6:00 p.m. The
meeting was originally scheduled for Tuesday but was rescheduled.
Severe weather and the Open Meetings Act (OMA) required multiple
meetings to be rescheduled to meet the required guidelines regarding
their agendas being publicly available.
All eleven members of the board were in attendance including
Chairman JR Glenn, Vice Chairman Dale Nelson, Lance Conahan, Kevin
Knauer, Kathy Schmidt, Hannah Fitzpatrick, Jim Wessbecher, Gil
Turner, Bob Sanders, Keenan Leesman, and Joseph Kuhlman.
This article is focused on the data center ordinance. A full rundown
of this meeting will be available in a future publication of Lincoln
Daily News.
The Zoning and Economic Development Committee presented two action
items to the board Thursday. The most significant of the two, and
the one that most members of the audience attended the meeting for,
was the data center ordinance. Turner read off the full motion,
which was to approve the ordinance with nine additional parts,
listed as follows:
a. An impact study must be done before a conditional use permit is
granted to any data center applicant.
b. That impact study must cover noise, light, water usage, and
environmental concerns of the data center.
c. The County Board will decide
what company completes the study, and the data center company that
is applying will cover the cost of said study.
d. Zoning Board of Appeals (ZBA) recommendation 1: the Zoning
Committee accepted adding language that would make it so that the
Logan County Health Department will have the results of the yearly
wastewater discharge study shared with them.
e. ZBA recommendation 2: the Zoning Committee accepted changing
“County noise standards” to meet all noise requirements listed by
the Illinois EPA.
f. ZBA recommendation 3: the Zoning Committee did not accept a line
stating that a 500 foot setback minimum would be required from any
data center from “nonparticipating property.” Rather, they added
that the distance would be determined by the County Board for each
data center project.
g. ZBA recommendation 4: the Zoning Committee accepted that the word
“owner” should be changed to “a person or entity.”
h. ZBA recommendation 5: the Zoning Committee accepted adding
protection of the tile drainage, similar to the windfarm ordinance,
to the data center ordinance.
i. ZBA recommendation 6: the Zoning Committee did not accept adding
a decommissioning plan. Rather, a decommissioning plan will be
developed in a separate amendment.
Once Turner finished reading all parts of the motion, Leesman asked
if the board should vote on each one separately. He reasoned that
there may be amendments to add to different parts, and that he has
at least five himself. Glenn stated that the board was going to vote
on the entire ordinance at once, and that they would go through any
potential amendments before voting on the entire thing.
Leesman began with the first of his five amendments. The first was
to add a “baseline study” to a and b. Leesman argued that an impact
study is pretty broad. A baseline study would give them somewhere to
start and would give the board “more enforceable measures.” This
amendment was voted on and approved 10-1, with Knauer being the only
‘no’ vote.
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Leesman’s second
amendment was in regard to the noise standards. He stated that
the ordinance should include both the Illinois EPA and county
standards. This amendment was also passed 10-1, with Knauer
again being the only ‘no’ vote.
The third amendment was in regard to the distance that the data
centers would have to be from other property. He stated that he
felt the new wording was not needed, as the old wording said
“500 or more,” meaning the County Board could make that distance
greater than 500 feet. He suggested blending both the original
and changed language, changing the ordinance to read “500 or
more and to be determined by the County Board.” A vote was taken
and this amendment also passed by 9-2. Both Knauer and Conahan
voted against it.
Leesman’s fourth amendment covered point i, with Leesman stating
that the word “data” was missing in front of “Center
Decommissioning Plan,” and that the words “will be binding to
the ordinance” must be added at the end. Nelson stated that a
decommissioning plan was already in the works. Sanders asked
about the changes being made, and if there were so many that it
would need to go back through the legal review process. Glenn
stated that he did not think so, and State’s Attorney Brad Hauge,
who was in the audience, assured the Board that everything was
fine so far. A vote was taken and this amendment also passed
9-2. Both Knauer and Conahan once again voted ‘no.’
The fifth and final of Leesman’s amendments was over the
definition of data centers. He argued that the 20-megawatt (MW)
minimum should be lowered to a 10MW minimum. Leesman’s reasoning
was due to the ever-advancing nature of technology. Since
technology is always getting more efficient, he argued, there
may be some data centers in the future that are more energy
efficient and come in under that 20 MW minimum to be held
accountable by this ordinance. This amendment passed 10-1, with
Knauer voting against it.
Glenn then had an amendment he stated
that he would entertain if someone made. This motion would be to add
“health concerns” to the list of things the impact and baseline
study would address. Leesman made the amendment and it was passed
10-1. Knauer once again voted ‘no.’
Glenn’s amendment was the final made,
and so the Board took a vote on the original motion as amended after
Glenn recounted all the amendments that were made. The data center
ordinance failed in a vote of 5-6. Wessbecher, Conahan, Fitzpatrick,
Knauer, Kuhlman, and Sanders voted against, while Glenn, Nelson,
Schmidt, Leesman, and Turner voted for. Those who were in attendance
against the data center ordinance all cheered after it was announced
the ordinance failed.
[Matt Boutcher]
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