Before the Developer Arrives: Guardrails Without Closing the Door

By Senior Associate Mandy Witt

Data centers are creating new conversations in communities across Wisconsin. Questions about power, water, noise, infrastructure, land use, and long-term impacts are prompting some communities to consider new regulations and, in some cases, temporary moratoriums.

Those are fair questions. Large developments should be evaluated carefully.

But they also raise a broader question for economic development: How much should be decided before a developer arrives, and how much should be evaluated when there is an actual project on the table?

Communities already have a number of tools for reviewing development. Zoning and land-use regulations establish where certain uses can occur. Planning staff and commissions review proposals. Elected officials make decisions. Public hearings provide opportunities for input. Development agreements can address infrastructure, responsibilities, and other project-specific conditions.

New types of development may require additional guardrails. Data centers are a good example. Their size and infrastructure needs can differ significantly from the commercial and industrial projects many communities have traditionally encountered.

But additional guardrails don't necessarily have to mean closing the door while every possible scenario is studied.

From a commercial real estate perspective, certainty matters.

Companies considering a significant investment are evaluating more than the price of land or the availability of utilities. They are also evaluating the process. What is allowed? What approvals are required? Who makes those decisions? What standards must be met? And is there a reasonable path to an answer?

Communities need flexibility, too.

Not every data center is the same, just as not every manufacturing plant, warehouse or housing development is the same. Technology changes. Sites are different. Infrastructure requirements vary. Developers bring different plans and different levels of investment.

It can be difficult to create rules today that anticipate every project that may come along tomorrow.

Perhaps being "development ready" is less about having every answer in advance and more about having a process capable of reaching an answer.

That means having reasonable standards and guardrails in place while preserving the ability to evaluate the merits of the actual proposal.

A community can ultimately say yes. It can say no. It can also say yes, but only if certain conditions are met.

What matters to both communities and developers is understanding how that decision will be made.

Economic development will continue to change, and data centers won't be the last new use to challenge traditional ideas about land, infrastructure, and development.

The goal doesn't have to be anticipating every possibility.

It can simply be having a process strong enough to evaluate the opportunity when it arrives - without unnecessarily closing the door before anyone knocks.