AFRICATOWN NEWS – PRICHARD Data Center Community Meeting – “Not in my back yard”

“It was hot, the air conditioning was not working in Prichard’s Auditorium and most of the attendees at the meeting were over the age of 50”.

More than 200 people packed the “non-airconditioned” Prichard Municipal Auditorium to find out more about an Ai Data Center that is seeking permission from The Prichard City Council to build a facility on the east side of the intersection of Telegraph Road and Edwards Street. The community meeting had been advertised to begin at 6 pm and end at 7 pm. Consequently, most attendees were wondering if the data center representatives would have time to answer their questions on the spot and not weeks later through an email or regular mail.

The meeting begin at 6:05. After Prichard’s Mayor and a councilmember said a few words It was 6:15 when Edged Data Center Representative Christopher Garland was handed the microphone. At 6:45 an attendee at the meeting stood up and interrupted Mr. Garland’s presentation by asking the question, “when are you going to allow the people in here to ask questions about your data center. You have already said that the meeting will end at 7 and you are taking up all the time with you presentation”. At that time Mr. Garland shut down his presentation and begin to answer questions from the audience. About 10 people got a chance to ask questions or make comments about a data center coming to Prichard. 100% of the question and comments about the location of an Ai Data Center were negative. It got to where I thought I was in church back in the 1950’s without air conditioning where everyone was shouting or fainting and you did not know if it was the spirit moving around or people suffering from a heat stroke. Both State Senator Vivian Figures and Prichard Mayor Carletta Davis spoke and said they heard the people loud and clear and what they heard the people say was, “Do not put that Data Center in my back yard”. Now we will have to see what the Prichard City Council heard and how they will vote.

Years ago, there was something called community goodwill, where industry would spread goodwill throughout the community to show that they cared about the residents they are about to intrude upon. These Data Centers make billions of dollars annually and should be able to show good intent to residents from the community. Edged scheduled this community meeting about a month ago and should have known that the auditorium had an air condition problem. Here’s something for you Mr. Edged Data Center, how about writing a check to the city of Prichard for them to repair their air condition. By the way, you can write the amount of the check off on your taxes.

Dr. Major Joe Womack USMCR (ret.)

Executive Director of

africatown-chess.org

Co-Founder of

africatownhpf.org

251-404-9558

Leader, Doer, Storyteller

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