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Eagle Mountain requests county consideration of 327-acre CRA to attract a data center; commissioners raise term and school-district payment concerns
Summary
Eagle Mountain City presented a proposal for a 327-acre community reinvestment area intended to host a large data center with initial capital investment around $600 million; the city proposes 100% participation on personal property and 67.5% on real property for tax increment, phased 20 years per phase (cap 40 years), and a 10% housing set-aside. County commissioners asked about the 40-year cap and a company-proposed $250,000-per-phase payment to the Alpine School District.
Tom Westmoreland, mayor of Eagle Mountain, and Aaron Sanborn, the city's economic development director, presented a proposed Community Reinvestment Area (CRA) on roughly 327 acres adjacent to the existing Facebook data center.
"It's roughly 327 acres in size," Sanborn said, describing the tract as currently vacant and carrying a low taxable value because of greenbelt status. Sanborn said the project would be competitive for an enterprise-scale data center and initially proposed an estimated capital investment of about $600 million (assessed at roughly $470 million).
Sanborn described proposed tax-increment mechanics: personal property participation at 100% (citing that data centers often have little personal-property taxation elsewhere) and real-property participation negotiated at 67.5% (lowered from an initial 75% request). He said the RDA would receive the increment and estimated the project would yield about $7.8 million to the Eagle Mountain RDA over a phase lifetime (about $390,000 per year) with a 10% statutory housing set-aside.
Commissioners asked detailed questions about phasing, infrastructure and public costs. One commissioner said, "40 years troubles me," referencing the proposal's potential phase cap of 40 years (20 years per phase, with multiple phases possible). A county official raised concern about a company-proposed contribution "to the Alpine School District," which city staff clarified had been proposed as $250,000 per phase.
City staff said their negotiation reduced the original 75% increment request to 67.5% and that the development agreement would establish milestones and conditions tied to each phase so the RDA and participants meet deliverables before incentives are granted. The city also highlighted potential infrastructure benefits, including water reuse plans and ancillary economic development (construction jobs, local business support, philanthropy and workforce partnerships).
No county action on the CRA was taken at the meeting. City officials said the Eagle Mountain RDA and city have approved interlocal agreements and the next step is for county review and negotiation of development-agreement terms and any interlocal commitments.
Ending: County staff will review the development agreement, infrastructure assumptions and fiscal impacts; the matter will return for additional consideration rather than a final county vote at this meeting.
