The Pulaski County Plan Commission spent much of its meeting reviewing draft ordinance language to temporarily halt permit issuance for new data centers while county staff and consultants study potential zoning and public‑safety changes.

Staff told the panel that the Board of Commissioners sent a letter on Nov. 17 asking the Plan Commission to recommend a six‑month moratorium; staff had initially sought a 12‑month moratorium to allow time to draft precise definitions and policy safeguards. “They're recommending additions to the UDO for data centers to place a moratorium for 6 months on the issuance of permits,” staff said during the meeting.

The disagreement centered on how to define a data center. Staff and the county attorney cautioned that a broad definition without a size threshold could unintentionally regulate in‑house data rooms used by banks and phone companies. Staff said the attorney is drafting language that would describe a data center as “a physical facility that houses a large concentration of network computer servers, storage systems and networking equipment used by organizations for the storage, management, processing and transmission of large amounts of digital data,” and the attorney will consider size limits to avoid covering ordinary business IT rooms.

Commission members voiced differing views about the moratorium’s length. One commissioner said six months is unlikely to allow completion of the needed work and favored 12 months or more; another expressed concern that shortening the period would be “hand tying” that limits the commission’s ability to study the ordinance thoroughly. Staff emphasized that no vote was taken that night and that documentation for either a six‑ or 12‑month moratorium would be available for the board’s next meeting.

What happens to existing facilities was also raised. Commissioners asked whether banks or other businesses with in‑building data storage would be exempt. Staff replied that smaller, in‑house storage would likely be treated differently than large commercial installations but that the attorney will confirm exemption language.

Next steps: staff will return refined moratorium language and clarifications of the data‑center definition for the commission and the Board of Commissioners to consider in a future public hearing; no formal moratorium vote was recorded at this meeting.