The proliferation of data centers in Northern Virginia could end up affecting even urbanized communities like Arlington, officials said at a recent forum.
“We are all connected,” County Board Chair Matt de Ferranti said of regional data-center impacts at the 11th annual Northern Virginia Regional Elected Leaders Summit.
The event was held yesterday (Wednesday) at Mason Square, George Mason University’s Arlington campus. In addition to de Ferranti, participants included Alexandria Mayor Alyia Gaskins, Fairfax County Board of Supervisors Chair Jeff McKay and Loudoun County Board of Supervisors Chair Phyllis Randall.
Arlington and Alexandria have seen limited impacts from the data center growth spurt in Fairfax, Loudoun and Prince William counties. But the ramifications of that growth are trickling down, de Ferranti said.
“The next 10 years look very different for Northern Virginia [in terms of impacts] than the last 20 years,” said de Ferranti, who in January rotated in for a one-year stint as County Board chair.
He said “the balance hasn’t quite been there,” driving a recent shift in public opinion against data centers.
A planned center near Edsall Road in the Lincolnia area of Fairfax County is located close to Alexandria’s city line, and will affect residents and schools. Data centers “still have regional impacts — they don’t stop at a city line or county line,” Gaskins said.
“We’re going to feel the impacts” of the Edsall Road proposal, she said, explaining why the city’s leadership has voiced its opposition to Fairfax officials.
“We felt it was critical to weigh in,” Gaskins said.
In Fairfax County, leaders have been facing growing pressure to use their regulatory powers to deny the data center application.
While impacts have been modest thus far for the inner areas of Northern Virginia, Loudoun County has been ground zero in the growth of centers and their effects for more than a decade.
Loudoun has benefited from massive influxes of revenue, allowing the county to maintain the lowest tax rate across the region. But it has come at a quality-of-life cost, county officials are increasingly acknowledging.
“If we could rewind the clock, we would do a lot of things differently,” Randall said. But “once the horse is out of the barn, it’s hard to get the horse back.”
Next-generation data centers may require a significantly smaller physical footprint, making them increasingly viable for areas like Arlington and Alexandria and a bigger portion of Fairfax County.
Randall urged localities across Virginia, urban and rural, to “look at Loudoun County as a cautionary tale,” and be prepared from a planning and zoning standpoint.
Done right, “you can get the revenue and not have all the negative consequences,” she said.
Straddling a middle ground between far-flung Loudoun and more urban Alexandria and Arlington, Fairfax County has seen limited expansion of data centers in recent years.
McKay said residents of his community are seeking “fair rules of engagement” when it comes to addressing the centers’ negative contributions.
“We need to make sure our regulations have adapted,” he said.
At the same time, McKay noted that most of those who arrive to testify against data centers locally usually have cellphones in their hands. Cellphones, like many other pieces of modern technology, only work with data centers providing the infrastructure to power them, he noted.
“We have to acknowledge they are needed,” McKay said.
The annual Elected Leaders Summit, now in its 11th year, is cosponsored by the Arlington and Northern Virginia chambers of commerce. Cosponsors included the Alexandria and Loudoun chambers of commerce, Northern Virginia Regional Commission and Regional Elected Leaders Initiative.
While the Arlington County Board chair’s position rotates among Board members annually, the board chairs of Fairfax and Loudoun and mayor of Alexandria are posts elected separately from those communities’ governing bodies.
The four elected leaders are all Democrats. De Ferranti is seeking reelection this year, facing challenges from independents Audrey Clement and David Sisson. The posts held by McKay, Gaskins and Randall all will be on the ballot in November 2027.
Randall already has picked up a challenger from within the Democratic ranks, with Loudoun Supervisor Juli Briskman pledging to run on a platform to stop the proliferation of data centers in the county.
At the Aug. 26 forum, Randall attempted to blunt that line of attack, saying she had been focused on putting guardrails on the industry before it became politically fashionable to do so.
Randall said localities do not have the statutory authority to enact a moratorium or outright ban on future data centers. But local governments can use their land-use powers to get the best deal possible, she said.
