Fifteen actions, and whether the instrument binds
The deck
The story
Fifteen actions, five, five and five.
Twelve Texas governments acted on a data center or server facility. The instrument's shape decides whether anything stops.
March 10th to August 13th, 156 days.
Each of these acted. Not one of their records carries a date the action takes effect.
A reader can't tell from these five whether anything stopped.
Hays County, El Paso, Lubbock County, Brazoria County and Fort Worth each reached for a resolution.
The commission's vote is a recommendation. The council decides.
The motion bans nothing. It directs staff to bring options back.
The resolution starts the legal process toward a moratorium.
"Initial cooling system fill shall not exceed 8.0 gallons per square foot of Gross Building Area"
San Angelo wrote three of the five. On five more the record carries no date the action takes effect.
Four applications. None was voted on.
Commissioner Linder made a motion to deny order 1.3.
Two declined. Two said yes.
Seventeen times a Texas local government took one up. Fifteen acted and two did not.
Tom Green County voted not to pursue a moratorium in one commissioner's precinct. A commissioner referenced a $100 million lawsuit against Hill County over a similar one year moratorium.
Wichita Falls approved a data center and barred evaporative cooling with it. Williamson County approved an abatement.
Two doors have dates.
Eight items in this record carry a public step still ahead. The two that reach a data center both sit with a state body.
Fort Worth must hold two hearings before its pause takes effect. The city set the first as a deadline of November 10th.
Large load demand management service. Anyone may file.
Every data center in the queue. Public comment opens the meeting.
What was verified
The council approved the first steps toward a 90 day moratorium on new data center applications.
the first steps to initiate a 90-day moratorium on accepting, processing and approving new applications for data centers
The pause would not begin until February 16th and only after public hearings and further votes.
If a moratorium is ultimately approved, the 90-day pause will take effect Feb. 16, after public hearings have been held and votes taken as required by state law and reports and studies from the city's Data Center & Infrastructure Committee have been submitted to Fort Worth officials.
Commissioners voted unanimously against the abatement after hearing residents.
ARCHER COUNTY, Texas (KAUZ) - Archer County Commissioners unanimously voted Monday against a proposed tax abatement for a data center project planned in the county after hearing concerns from residents during a packed Commissioners Court meeting.
More than 30 residents attended to oppose the incentive tied to the Dynamo Ventures development.
More than 30 residents attended the meeting to voice opposition to the tax incentive tied to the proposed development by Dynamo Ventures LLC.
The denial does not halt the project.
While the vote denied the tax abatement request, it does not stop the project from moving forward.
The resolution passed with one dissenting vote, the county judge's.
The resolution passed four to one, with only judge Curtis Parrish voting against it due to its language.
A commissioner said during the meeting that resolutions accomplish nothing.
Resolutions do nothing, they are not binding.
The resolution creates no new county power and can't pause a privately financed project.
Nothing in this non-binding resolution creates or expands county authority. It does not require the county to take any action or authorize the county to prohibit, suspend, delay, or impose a moratorium on a privately financed project, except as expressly permitted by Texas law.
The court denied the order creating Brazoria County Reinvestment Zone No. 26-01 on a unanimous motion to deny.
Commissioner Linder made a motion to deny order 1.3, Commissioner Adams seconded. Motion to deny passed 5-0.
The abatement items that followed received no action because the zone item failed.
No action taken due to I.3 failed
The affected applicants included two entities named as data center companies and two named as power companies.
Granting Tax Abatement of Old Ocean Datacenter LLC
The City of San Angelo reports the water usage ordinance passed 7 to 0.
Approved 7-0 at the June 16, 2026 City Council meeting.
The city files the direction as a council item naming high intensity data processing facilities and listing what staff is asked to evaluate.
Discussion and possible action directing City staff to evaluate the impacts of High-Intensity Data Processing Facilities on municipal infrastructure, water resources, electrical demand, and land-use compatibility, and to develop and present recommendations for regulatory standards related to water use, conservation, water reuse, cooling technologies, resource efficiency, and other operational and environmental considerations applicable to such facilities; and any other matter incident thereto.
Laredo's matter history records no action taken on June 15th, 2026.
"MatterHistoryActionName":"no action taken"
The court voted against a temporary moratorium on large scale energy and data center development in Precinct 4 after a Beacon Data Centers presentation.
SAN ANGELO, Texas — The Tom Green County Commissioners' Court voted Tuesday not to pursue a temporary moratorium on large-scale energy and data center development in Precinct 4 after hearing a presentation from Beacon Data Centers about its proposed Westline Site in Dove Creek.
A commissioner cited litigation against Hill County over a similar moratorium.
Commissioner Shawn Nanny referenced a recent $100 million lawsuit filed against Hill County after it approved a similar one-year moratorium.
The commission denied the permit against a staff recommendation to approve.
The commission voted 4-1 to deny the permit for ONMINE's proposed $30 million facility, despite a staff recommendation for approval.
The council, not the commission, makes the final zoning decision.
The final decision on the data center zoning will be made by the Killeen City Council, using the commission's vote as a recommendation.
The TWDB board agenda for July 23rd, 2026 carried an item to act on a rulemaking petition seeking a dedicated industrial water use category for data centers and crypto mining.
Consider acting on a petition for rulemaking filed by Margaret Hill and Co-Petitioners related to a dedicated industrial water-use category for Data Centers and Crypto-Mining Operations
TRWD states it has signed no new water supply contract specifically to serve a data center.
TRWD has not entered into any new water supply contracts specifically to serve data center projects, nor has TRWD increased contract volumes for existing customers based on requests specifically made to serve data centers.
The same July 21st, 2026 council meeting included a data center briefing covering the Governor's recent guidelines.
Briefing on Data Centers, including overview of Governor Abbott's recent guidelines.
Fort Worth's council adopted a resolution starting the statutory process toward a moratorium, rather than a moratorium.
Council adopted a resolution that initiates the legal process to enact a moratorium on new data center development applications while the City completes its regulatory framework.
The city calls February 16th a tentative adoption vote rather than the date a pause begins.
The City would then need to complete the additional public notices, hearings and ordinance readings as outlined under state law before voting on adoption of the moratorium, tentatively set for Feb. 16, 2027.
The first of two required hearings is set as a deadline of November 10th rather than a fixed date.
In accordance with the Council's direction, the first of the two required public hearings to advance the moratorium process will be held not later than Nov. 10, the week following the presentation of the DCIC's report.
A pause would not reach a project already vested under Chapter 245 of the Texas Local Government Code.
It does not impact projects already in progress or vested meeting the requirements of Chapter 245 of the Texas Local Government Code.
Fort Worth's council agenda system holds no meeting later than June 16th, so the August 11th record is not posted there.
"EventBodyName":"CITY COUNCIL WORKSESSION","EventDate":"2026-06-16T00:00:00"
A developer sued Hill County for over $100 million and the county withdrew the moratorium it had passed.
A few weeks later, the county rescinded the moratorium in favor of a checklist of requirements for developers after a local data center developer filed a lawsuit against the county for over $100 million in damages.
The Governor states the standard the state applies and the consequence of failing it.
Any project that fails to comply with the requirements set forth by the PUCT and ERCOT, and by state law, must be denied connection to the Texas grid.
The Texas Water Development Board denied the petition asking for a standalone data center water demand category.
the three-member board also denied a petition by Wimberley resident Margaret Elizabeth Hill
The Corpus Christi motion does not ban data centers, it directs staff to bring options back.
The motion does not ban data centers in Corpus Christi. It directs staff to develop possible policy options and bring those recommendations back to city council.
The Lubbock County resolution asks any large business to disclose its water and electricity use, not only a data center.
the wording opens it up for any major business to disclose how much water and electricity it would use for its projects
San Angelo's ordinance caps a data center's initial cooling fill at 8.0 gallons per square foot of gross building area.
Initial cooling system fill shall not exceed 8.0 gallons per square foot of Gross Building Area (as defined in the approved building permit) for each Data Center building.
The same ordinance caps routine makeup water at six percent of installed cooling loop volume per building per year and requires cooling water to be metered separately.
Routine cooling system makeup water (to replace minor losses from valve packing, gasket weepage, and maintenance drain-downs) shall not exceed six percent (6%) of the total installed cooling loop volume per Data Center building per calendar year.
The ordinance amends the city water service rules by adding a data center section. It was introduced with a public hearing on May 19th, 2026 and finally passed on June 16th, 2026.
INTRODUCED with public hearing the 19th day of May 2026 and finally PASSED this 16th day of June 2026.
San Marcos City Council voted 4 to 3 on June 16th, 2026 to define data centers in its zoning laws and make them ineligible anywhere in the city.
define data centers and make them ineligible for any part of the city in its zoning laws
Hays County Commissioners Court approved a 180 day emergency water protection review period for high usage development applications, data centers named among them, and created a review board.
approved a resolution establishing a 180-day emergency water protection review period for high-usage development applications, including data centers, and creating a review board to evaluate the proposals
The Wichita Falls Planning and Zoning Commission approved a conditional use request for a DataNovaX data center in an existing building on Airport Drive.
Another data center is coming to Wichita Falls after the Planning and Zoning Commission approved a conditional-use request for an existing building on Airport Drive.
El Paso City Council approved the Data Center Policy Framework resolution on July 20th, 2026 on a motion that carried.
A motion was made by Representative Boyar Trejo, seconded by Representative Limón, to Approve the item. The motion carried by the following vote:
The El Paso item is a resolution adopting a Data Center Policy Framework.
Discussion and action to approve a Resolution for the adoption of the Data Center Policy Framework.
Brazoria County adopted a resolution on data center development on June 9th, 2026. Its own agenda system records the matter as Adopted.
Resolution Regarding the Development of Data Centers and Related Facilities in the State of Texas
San Angelo's zoning ordinance allows a new data center as a principal use only by Conditional Use.
New data centers shall be permitted as a principal use by Conditional Use (CU) only, in accordance with procedures set forth in Section 208.
The San Angelo zoning ordinance was introduced with a public hearing on May 5th, 2026 and finally passed on May 19th, 2026.
INTRODUCED with public hearing the 5th day of May 2026, and finally PASSED this 19th day of May, 2026.
San Angelo's sewer rules define a data center discharge event and regulate it.
a discharge event means any intentional release of treated cooling fluid to the sanitary sewer system
Wichita Falls attached a condition to its approval prohibiting evaporative cooling systems.
We did prohibit evaporative cooling systems, so those systems that will be more water-intensive.
Williamson County Commissioners Court approved a Chapter 312 tax abatement agreement for a Compal USA Technology facility in Georgetown on April 15th, 2026.
The Williamson County Commissioners Court approved a Chapter 312 tax abatement incentive agreement for Compal USA Technology Inc. in Georgetown.
Fort Worth must hold two public hearings before a data center moratorium can take effect, and those hearings are where the public weighs in.
Before a moratorium can take effect, city council is required to hold two public hearings to allow the public to weigh in.