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Safe Harbor County president warns of environmental risks from newly adopted data-center overlay near Pocono Plateau

Carbon County Open Space Advisory Board · March 19, 2026
AI-Generated Content: All content on this page was generated by AI to highlight key points from the meeting. For complete details and context, we recommend watching the full video. so we can fix them.

Summary

At a Carbon County Open Space Advisory Board meeting, Linda Chrisman, president of Safe Harbor County, warned that a newly adopted data-center overlay zoning near the Pocono Plateau could threaten wetlands, streams and protected species, and described a pending legal challenge by the landowner.

Linda Chrisman, president of Safe Harbor County, told the Carbon County Open Space Advisory Board that an overlay zoning the Penn Forest supervisors recently adopted would allow a property owner to choose a data-center use in addition to existing residential zoning and that the site near the Pocono Plateau contains wetlands, springs and habitat for protected species.

“My name is Linda Chrisman, and I'm president of Safe Harbor County,” Chrisman said, then described the parcel as sitting on the edge of the Pocono Plateau, bordered by Lehigh and Water District land, with Bear Creek and Sawmill Run Creek traversing or near the property and with springs and extensive wetlands on site. She listed two federally listed bat species and said the variable sedge is included on Pennsylvania’s…

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