LOUISVILLE, Ky. (WDRB) – The group behind a proposed $6 billion data center in rural Oldham County also is working on a project in Illinois and one in the northeastern U.S., an official told WDRB News on Thursday.
Western Hospitality Partners – Kentucky LLC, or WHP, filed plans last month to build eight warehouse-style buildings on a 267-acre campus north of La Grange. The site would house computer servers and other equipment to process digital information.
The complex dubbed “Project Lincoln” would be among the largest economic development projects in Kentucky history based on its investment costs. Once operational, it would generate an estimated $51.4 million in local tax revenue annually.
But the venture has drawn opposition from some residents who believe the location isn’t the right fit for a data center, amid other concerns. Oldham Judge-Executive David Voegele announced last week that an April meeting of a county board to discuss the plan will be postponed to allow for public meetings.
Meanwhile, until now there has been little public knowledge about the development team and its track record.
In an interview, WHP representative Max Kepes called his group a “well-funded and well-capitalized company based out of New York” that has been involved in at least two similar data center projects.
He said his team works on land use and utility infrastructure for “several reputable end users” that he declined to identify.
Kepes confirmed that his group is connected with a proposed data center in Braidwood, Illinois, about 60 miles south of Chicago. That $40 million project is eying a location near I-55 there and would create 200 to 300 construction jobs and 200 technical positions and other jobs, the Free Press Newspapers reported last month.
Another project is “in a very well-established data center market” in the northeast, Kepes said. Asked for more information, he said his group is under “layers of NDAs” – nondisclosure agreements.
But Kepes said a “great team” is involved in the Oldham County project, including Cliff Ashburner, a prominent land-use attorney based in Louisville, and Jim Urban, Oldham County’s former director of planning and development.
Kepes said WHP began discussions with Louisville Gas & Electric/Kentucky Utilities about 8 to 10 months ago. The site of Ky. 53 is attractive, he said, because of its proximity to high-voltage power and fiber lines, a natural tree buffer and a slope that would require minimal grading.
About 200 acres would be retained as green space under the current plan.
“The utility identified this as a very suitable site early in the process when we engaged with them, and the proximity to Louisville as a market is obviously of chief importance here,” Kepes said.
From there, he said the developers approached the property owners.
While the focus is on WHP’s announced site, the group also could consider splitting the project into two sections, along with an area near I-71 at 3210 D.W. Griffith Lane if the necessary power can’t be provided at the Ky. 53 location, according to an economic impact report.
That report, which was shared with WDRB, says the data center campus “would serve as an economic pillar for Oldham County and the surrounding area.”
It anticipates creating 176 direct jobs at an annual salary of $83,000, in addition to supporting hundreds more jobs in retail, restaurant and other sectors.
Urban, the former planning director, said the project would help diversify Oldham County’s tax base – a goal identified roughly 25 years ago for the county just north of Louisville.
Because of the property tax revenue projections, Oldham County schools would be the biggest beneficiary of new tax revenues, at about $38.4 million per year, the study estimates.
“You can allow residential growth to happen, but realistically the only way to do it was to bring in businesses, because that changes the impact -- on especially schools,” Urban said.
He said he understands some of the environmental and other concerns from opponents of the project, but “we aren't having that discussion about what our tax base is and where it's heading.”
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