It appears that the rumored Irwin County datacenter tax pre-payment proposal is vaporware, speculation, hearsay.

The response from the Irwin County Clerk on July 21 was:

“I have received your request. At this time, there are no documents responsive to your request.”

Datacenter deal proposal in Ocilla Star 2026-07-01, no documents responsive, Irwin County Clerk 2026-07-21

That was in response to my open records request of July 19, 2026:

This is a Georgia Open Records Act (GORA) request for the proposal described in the Ocilla Star in its July 1, 2026, edition, in a story entitled “County Begins Discussions on New Administrator, New Authority Appointments.”

The description in that story is:

“a proposal for the data center company to pre-pay estimated, pro-rated taxes to the county, with the first payment arriving by the end of this year. The school system will also be included in the pre-paid, leasehold agreement.

“That estimated payment, according to those involved in the negotiations, is in the ballpark of $50 million a year for the next 10 years.”

Remember that the applicants who got the Special Exception on May 20, 2026, still do not have an AI company end user. How do we know? Well, that’s what they told me after that May meeting. And don’t you think they would be loudly proclaiming it if they had one?

Here are the relevant parts of the referenced news story.

Luke Roberts, Ocilla Star, July 1, 2026, County Begins Discussions on New Administrator, New Authority Appointments

The Irwin County Commission held their monthly workshop on Monday evening, June 29, at the Irwin County Courthouse where they were set to discuss the hiring of a new county administrator and the appointment of members to the newly established Industrial Authority for the proposed data center. The meeting was held after The Star’s press deadline; a full report will be featured in the next issue.

Annotated Concept Site Plan, 2026-04-24 –Kimley-Horn annotated by SGRC

…

The commission is expected to move quickly on the appointment of members to the new Industrial Authority that was recently established to negotiate a financial agree ment with the company set to construct a data center in Irwin County that will see the county receive tax pre-payments as soon as this year.

Sources tell The Star the new Authority is likely to consist of 2 Irwin County Commission members, 2 Irwin County Board of Education members, and 3 at-large members.

The appointments are expected to be approved at the county’s July regular monthly meeting on Monday, July 6, at 6:00 pm at the Irwin County Courthouse.

According to County Chairman Vince Thompson, negotiations between the county and representatives for the group behind the development of the data center project resulted in a proposal for the data center company to pre-pay estimated, pro-rated taxes to the county, with the first payment arriving by the end of this year. The school system will also be included in the pre-paid, leasehold agreement.

That estimated payment, according to those involved in the negotiations, is in the ballpark of $50 million a year for the next 10 years.

For much more about datacenters, see:

https://wwals.net/issues/datacenters

Annotated Overall Concept Site Plan, 2026-04-24 –Kimley-Horn annotated by SGRC

You can see the Alapaha River to the left on those maps, above the Floridan Aquifer.

 -jsq, John S. Quarterman, Suwannee RIVERKEEPER®

You can help with clean, swimmable, fishable, drinkable, water in the 10,000-square-mile Suwannee River Basin in Florida and Georgia by becoming a WWALS member today!
https://wwals.net/donations/

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