Marion County FL 12-month large data center moratorium (2026)

Marion County, Fla. (county seat Ocala) — 12-MONTH (UP TO 365 DAYS) TEMPORARY MORATORIUM on accepting or processing applications for LARGE-SCALE DATA CENTERS, adopted by the BOARD OF COUNTY COMMISSIONERS at a public hearing at the McPherson Governmental Campus Auditorium on TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 15, 2026. VOTE STRUCTURE, RECORDED PRECISELY: the MOTION carried 4-1 (Commissioner KATHY BRYANT the lone 'no'); a SUBSEQUENT PROCEDURAL VOTE TO ADOPT THE ORDINANCE PASSED UNANIMOUSLY 5-0. Both figures are accurate and describe different votes; citing either alone misstates the record. OPERATIVE SCOPE IS BROAD ACROSS INSTRUMENTS: a pause of up to 365 days on ALL DEVELOPMENT PERMITS, SITE PLANS, REZONINGS, AND CONDITIONAL USE PERMITS related to MAJOR COMMERCIAL DATA CENTERS and ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE PROCESSING facilities. Covering rezonings AND site plans AND conditional use permits closes the substitution routes that a permit-only pause leaves open. EXEMPTIONS FOR SMALLER FACILITIES are carved out; THE EXEMPTION THRESHOLD IS NOT STATED IN THE SOURCE, though the discussion is framed around FLORIDA'S 50-MEGAWATT STATE THRESHOLD (cf. SB 484 (FL Data Center Costs)). THE DISSENT IS THE MOST ANALYTICALLY USEFUL MATERIAL IN THIS ENTRY. Commissioner Bryant voted no NOT against the pause but AGAINST THE EXEMPTIONS, arguing that operations under the 50-megawatt state threshold carry enormous utility burdens: 'A 49-MEGAWATT FACILITY IS A 100,000 TO 200,000-SQUARE-FOOT DATA CENTER. THAT IS THE EQUIVALENT OF 10,000 TO 15,000 HOUSEHOLDS.' THAT IS A DIRECT CHALLENGE TO THRESHOLD DESIGN ACROSS THIS ENTIRE DATASET: a 50 MW line does not divide small from large, it divides regulated from unregulated, and a just-under-threshold project still imposes household-equivalent load in the five figures. It corroborates independently the household-equivalence arithmetic recorded at Eureka CA data center moratorium and 20,000 sq ft cap direction (2026), where staff put 1 MW at 500-1,000 homes — Bryant's 49 MW at 10,000-15,000 households implies roughly 200-300 homes per MW, a more conservative ratio from a different jurisdiction, and the two together bracket the figure. Bryant also REFUTED developer representatives' claims that county staff can handle applications today: 'OUR STAFF HAS EXPLICITLY STATED ON THE RECORD THAT THEY ARE NOT READY, THEY DO NOT HAVE THE CRITERIA, AND THEY DO NOT [HAVE] ALL THE RIGHT QUESTIONS TO ASK YET.' SUPPORTING RATIONALE: Commissioner MATT McCLAIN focused on preventing hyperscale facilities from overburdening local infrastructure without prohibiting smaller operators — 'I think the big concern is these really large hyperscale centers. I don't think it's the smaller ones, we can figure those out through the special use permit process' — and warned the code will require continuous revision: 'It's not like we're going to be able to set this code once and then never touch it again.' Commissioners CRAIG CURRY and MICHELLE STONE emphasised protecting the county's RURAL CHARACTER, FARMLAND and OUTSTANDING FLORIDA SPRINGS, naming SILVER SPRINGS and RAINBOW SPRINGS; Stone: 'We don't want to turn Marion County into Miami or New York.' The Outstanding Florida Waters designation is a state surface-water protection classification, and springs-shed protection is a distinct Florida-specific rationale not present elsewhere in this dataset. expires_date IS COMPUTED as 365 days from adoption and is not stated. ORDINANCE NUMBER NOT OBTAINED.