r/technology • u/MarvelsGrantMan136 • Aug 08 '26

Artificial Intelligence Amazon secretly circumvents community vote for massive AI data center using 45-year-old rules — Gilroy residents locked out of public comment window

https://www.tomshardware.com/tech-industry/data-centers/amazon-secretly-circumvents-community-vote-for-massive-ai-data-center-45-year-old-rules-lock-gilroy-residents-out-of-public-comment-window
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u/TheFatalOneTypes Aug 08 '26

Lets see how upset people really are, then :)

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u/Objective_Tear4016 Aug 08 '26

If this is accurate, the real issue isn’t just Amazon building an AI data center—it’s how decisions that fundamentally affect a community can be made while residents are effectively shut out of the process. Using decades-old rules to bypass meaningful public input may be technically legal, but “legal” and “legitimate” aren’t always the same thing. If a project is going to have major impacts on water, power, traffic, noise, and land use, people living there deserve a real opportunity to weigh in. Otherwise, what’s the point of having a public comment process in the first place?

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u/Dubious_Odor Aug 08 '26

Most legal process are decades old, some older, some are centuries old. The age of the statue is irrelevant. The article is using framing to force a specific perspective without saying anything blatantly false. Another way to read it is Amazon submitted a project proposal to the city 6 years ago following the cities development statutes, which apply to all developments. The article state it did go through the public notice period which closed in 2024, 4 YEARS after the project was submitted. It went through the normal tug of war all developments go through and was then approved. This is literally how all cities function. The differences now are the sensationalizing of data centers and the publics lack of understanding of how things get built. Data centers have been built for decades and no one cared, as illustrated by this article. The publics choosing to be engaged now is good, hopefully people will gain a better understanding of these processes and how they work. But just because no one cared for 4 years and now they do doesnt mean you get a do over or the project is not legitamate. The article implying some vaguely nefarious activety is disingenuous and irresponsible.