Cochise County staff schedules Feb. 11 work session on data centers and solar, flags comp plan adoption

Planning staff told the Cochise County Board of Adjustment that the county will hold a joint work session with the planning commission on Feb. 11 to discuss how to handle data centers and to update rules for utility‑scale solar projects.

"Right now, the zoning regulations don't address data centers," the planning director said, noting the county has no definition, permitted‑use classification or development standards for data centers and that staff seeks direction to draft a text amendment. The director described data centers as uses that can require large amounts of power and sometimes water for cooling and said the county would likely require utilities such as SSVEC or EPCOR to be partners for grid access.

On solar, staff said past projects and lessons learned over the last 15 years justify updating development standards, particularly for large, utility‑scale installations that take up substantial land area. The director told the board that solar typically uses little water aside from panel washing but that land‑use and visual impacts remain concerns.

Staff also briefed the board on a change in state law, signed in March, that gives counties the option to allow administrative approvals of subdivision plats (a process that previously required two public hearings). Staff said it will ask the board to consider delegating administrative approval authority to staff and noted that subdivisions remain rare outside larger municipalities because of state water‑assurance requirements.

Finally, the director said the county’s comprehensive plan is near completion, will go to the commission for recommendation on Feb. 11 (the same day as the work session), and is scheduled for board of supervisors adoption on March 10.

Next steps: staff will bring text‑amendment drafts and an approach to administrative plat approvals to the planning commission and then to the board for consideration.