Tulare County CA data center moratorium (extended to Aug 2027)

Tulare County, Cal. — ORDINANCE adopted by the Board of Supervisors at its August 2026 meeting imposing a 45-DAY MORATORIUM on CONSIDERATION of any artificial intelligence data centers, banning consideration of any new data center development for that period. DRIVER: concerns over HOW MUCH GROUNDWATER AI data centers could extract. REGULATORY CONTEXT, which is what distinguishes this from a generic water objection: Tulare County lies in the San Joaquin Valley and is subject to the SUSTAINABLE GROUNDWATER MANAGEMENT ACT (SGMA), under which groundwater sustainability agencies operate throughout the county and over-drafted basins must achieve sustainable yield on a statutory timetable. A county in that posture faces a CONFLICT OF LEGAL DUTIES when a large new industrial groundwater user applies, not merely a policy preference \u2014 the same structure recorded on Patterson CA data center moratorium extension Ord. 890 (2026), where the city was already obliged to REDUCE its pumping, but here at county scale across an agricultural economy. Supervisor LARRY MICARI referenced the groundwater sustainability agency boards and existing pressures on county farming. STATED PURPOSE: to give COUNTY PLANNERS TIME TO ALTER ZONING REGULATIONS that are ILL-PREPARED to consider the water, energy and infrastructure demands of AI data centers. PROCEDURAL FORM: 45 days is the initial term available under California's interim urgency ordinance procedure (Cal. Gov. Code \u00a7 65858), extendable by 10 months 15 days and then a further year \u2014 the same sequence Patterson used and which Tulare County may follow; THE SOURCE DOES NOT STATE whether an extension was sought, so expires_date is the unextended 45-day endpoint and SHOULD BE PRESUMED SUPERSEDED. SEPARATE MEASURE UNDER DISCUSSION: Supervisors Dennis Townsend and Larry Micari discussed a measure TO AUTOMATICALLY OPPOSE artificial intelligence data centers within county boundaries \u2014 a standing policy of opposition rather than a land-use pause, which is a distinct instrument and is NOT recorded here as adopted. [UPDATE 2026-10-01] ORIGINAL ADOPTION DATE: Aug. 18, 2026 (The Business Journal; Govly summary of the Aug. 18, 2026 Board of Supervisors meeting) — the earlier 2026-08-11 date is not supported by sources opened; the unextended 45-day term therefore ran to about Oct. 2, 2026, not Sept. 25. EXTENSION: on Tuesday, Sept. 22, 2026 the Board voted 5-0 (KMPH/FOX26; The Sun-Gazette) to extend the moratorium on new data center development in unincorporated Tulare County by 10 months and 15 days (KMPH; The Business Journal; The Sun-Gazette says 'another 10 months'), keeping it in place until August 2027 (The Business Journal; exact end date not stated, so expires_date is null). The Resource Management Agency was directed to return with proposed permanent zoning regulations before the interim ordinance expires. SEPARATE MEASURE NOW ADOPTED: the same day the Board voted 3-2 (Micari, Vander Poel, Shuklian yes; Valero, Townsend no) to adopt a position opposing data center development within Tulare County and approve a template letter of opposition (The Business Journal, citing a community coalition release).