As backlash to AI data centers grows in California, one company is pitching smaller facilities at up to 70 fairgrounds

# Data center backlash is sweeping Calif. One proposal met no opposition Source: [https://www.sfgate.com/california/article/edge-data-centers-fairgrounds-22418042.php](https://www.sfgate.com/california/article/edge-data-centers-fairgrounds-22418042.php) The backlash against[data centers](https://www.sfgate.com/tech/article/data-centers-22356298.php)in California has been growing\. The facilities have been outright[banned in Monterey Park](https://www.sfgate.com/tech/article/monterey-park-data-center-22301863.php)and the city of Coachella, while several towns have issued temporary[moratoriums](https://www.sfgate.com/california/article/imperial-county-data-centers-22310199.php)as officials evaluate their stances\. Meanwhile, public sentiment is souring, with 73% opposing the construction of data centers in their communities, according to a recent[Public Policy Institute of California survey](https://www.ppic.org/publication/ppic-statewide-survey-californians-and-the-environment-july-2026/)\. Even just a year ago, large swaths of Californians probably hadn’t even heard of data centers and, if they had, they likely didn’t know much about them\. The movement against these facilities, whether or not it’s been seeded by[Chinese bots](https://www.axios.com/2026/08/28/china-ai-data-center-backlash-bots), is reaching a fever pitch, as residents attend local community meetings in droves to urge area representatives to think twice about these projects\. But at an Aug\. 26 Southern California Fair & Events board meeting in Perris, no one showed up to oppose a potential data center on its premises\. The public comment period was silent\. So, the venue’s board of directors, a group of people chosen by the governor, went ahead and signed a nonbinding agreement to allow Global Stack, the company pitching the project, to further study the feasibility of a small data center on the state\-owned land\. Article continues below this ad Drone view of a 49\.5\-MW data center under construction in Vernon, Calif\., on Tuesday, July 14, 2026\. Myung J\. Chun/LATimes via GettySouthern California Fairgrounds CEO Russell Vandenberg said he was surprised no one attended the August meeting to voice opposition, especially since he’d watched videos of other fairground board meetings this summer at which Global Stack proposals were made\. As many as 100 people would show up with homemade signs demonizing data centers, and file in to protest — even in the extreme heat of summer\. “I was certainly expecting some \[protesters\], but nobody was here,” Vandenberg told SFGATE by phone Monday\. Global Stack, an infrastructure development company, is proposing what is called an “edge” data center for the fairgrounds in Perris\. This is a smaller, localized version of the massive computing facilities that usually cause local uproar\. It would be part of a larger complex on a roughly 5\-acre parcel — just a small portion of the fairground’s total acreage — that hosts a helipad and at least 500 parking spots\. If the company gets its way, these structures would sit within as many as 70 fairgrounds in California, but as protesters and angry residents show up at meetings across the state, it’s looking unlikely, even if the Southern California Fair gave the initial OK\. As residents have made their feelings known, Global Stack’s marketing has shifted to heavily focus on creating an “emergency response system” through these complexes, boasting the benefits of using the helipad for flights during a disaster and the data center for “blackout\-proof operations\.” The words “data center” are now mostly used to explain how unlike its system would be from what many oppose throughout California\. Article continues below this ad A person holds up a sign on a pedestrian bridge during a nationwide protest against AI data center expansion in Berkeley, Calif\., on July 18, 2026\. Josh Edelson/AFP via GettyThe presentations Global Stack has made to various fair boards in California weren’t even official proposals, but it doesn’t matter\. It also doesn’t matter that this type of proposed data center would be roughly the size of a shipping container, rather than the typically massive facilities that span hundreds of thousands of square feet\. Residents don’t want a facility that could gobble up massive amounts of water, push up electricity rates and contribute to pollution in their cities\. Even as the company plays down the “data center” moniker, the damage has already been done\. The majority of Californians live close to a data center, though they probably couldn’t say where one is in their area\. Nearly 300 of these facilities are located throughout the state, with most of them situated in major metropolitan areas\. The Bay Area has the highest concentration, but these technology hubs are hiding in plain sight all over California, stretching back to the 1990s, long before “data center” became a dirty word\. But, in response to overwhelming public pushback at a June meeting,[Calistoga won’t consider the project](https://www.sfgate.com/news/bayarea/article/calistoga-residents-bash-proposal-for-data-22321748.php)for its fairgrounds\.[Solano County](https://www.sfgate.com/news/bayarea/article/solano-co-fairgrounds-board-ditches-emergency-22347384.php)and Sonoma County also declined to move forward\. Tulare and Kings County have signed the nonbinding agreements, known as memorandums of understanding or MOUs, but area residents continue to express their concerns\. “All I have to say is that this is shady and predatory and very concerning to say the least,”[one woman said at a July 21 meeting](https://www.facebook.com/KSEE24/videos/1568781125045690/)\. Article continues below this ad A view of the Cow Palace in Daly City, Calif\. Smith Collection/Gado/Getty ImagesAntelope Valley Fairgrounds also signed an MOU, and the Cow Palace, a historic fairgrounds on the edge of San Francisco, is still considering the company’s proposal\. Vandenberg admits he’s not that familiar with data centers, though he knows they notoriously use a lot of water for cooling\. The Global Stack structure uses a “closed\-loop cooling system,” the company says in its[website FAQ](https://globalstackusa.com/faq), and there’s “no connection to the municipal water supply\.” Water is a huge concern for data center development, and Vandenberg thinks that may be why no one turned up at the board meeting in Perris — water isn’t as scarce a resource in Orange County as it is in the central part of the state\. Article continues below this ad Shaolei Ren, a UC Riverside associate professor who has studied data center resource use extensively, told SFGATE via email that “‘closed\-loop’ does not automatically mean zero water use\.” Board members should ask more questions to better understand how much water the Global Stack proposal would use in Perris: “Even if a facility uses little or no water onsite, the electricity supplying it can have a sizable water footprint because many power plants withdraw or consume water for cooling,” Ren said\. City officials in Monterey Park, Calif\., had previously welcomed its plans to build a sprawling new data center and the jobs and tax revenue that would follow, but suddenly opposition to the plan cropped up\. Robert Gauthier?LATimes via GettyHyperscale data centers typically use 100 MW or more of power, while Global Stack’s proposal says it will use just 8 to 10 MW\. That load is still “substantial,” Ren said, especially if the local grid is already overloaded\. Even these smaller centers could push up electricity rates for customers and end up requiring new area infrastructure\. If that 8\-to\-10\-MW center is running 24/7, it would be equivalent to the energy use of 7,000 to 9,000 average U\.S\. homes\. That may not be the full story, though, since data centers act very differently from households, Ren said\. Article continues below this ad For Vandenberg, the appeal of the proposal is the parking\. Fairgrounds across the state have complained of parking woes for years, he said, and he guesses that’s what’s most attractive to the fairgrounds being pitched\. “Parking is definitely a scarcity on fairgrounds,” Vandenberg said\. “We run out of parking on a regular basis\.” He explained that the board would love to build a parking structure like the one Global Stack proposed, but it’d likely cost at least $3 million\. “That's the kind of money we would never be able to secure and invest into a structure like that,” Vandenberg said\. Plus, the fairgrounds would get to keep all the revenue generated from those parking spaces, a crucial source of money that could help give these venues a financial boost\. Aerial view of a three\-level 49\.5\-MW data center under construction on April 14, 2026, in Vernon, Calif\. Mario Tama/Getty ImagesThat revenue would be just a portion of what Global Stack promises\. In a presentation shared with fairgrounds, sketches of the venues show tents blanketing the grounds, with first responders assisting during an emergency\. Each helipad acts as a critical transportation mechanism for disaster relief, shuttling in supplies and acting as a medevac, according to the presentation\. With the heliport and data center revenue share, a fairground could net around $2 million annually, while also creating upward of 7,000 jobs, the presentation said\. Article continues below this ad  Access our new app with ad\-free reading, curated maps and more\. [GET IT NOW](https://sfgate.com/friend/) “California's fairgrounds are treasured public assets, but they are chronically underfunded\. Global Stack was built to bring the public and private sectors together to strengthen the resilience of a disaster\-prone state, and our model routes steady, long\-term lease revenue back to the grounds, with the surrounding communities in mind,” Global Stack co\-founder Daniel Kang wrote SFGATE via email in July\. Vandenberg’s concerns center on the financial stability of a new company like Global Stack, which was only founded this year\.[Reporting by the San Francisco Chronicle](https://www.sfchronicle.com/california/article/fairgrounds-data-center-california-global-stack-22353158.php)also unearthed that the daughter of Michael Flores, the deputy secretary for fairs and expositions under the California Department of Food and Agriculture, who facilitated introductions for Global Stack, had worked at the company\. It’s brought up concerns about Flores’ intentions\. Even with a signed MOU and no local opposition, Vandenberg said the Global Stack proposal has a long way to go and is in no way an approved project for Perris\. And as much as the idea of added parking is tempting, the company has to prove itself\. “The last thing I would want is a half\-finished parking structure that I wouldn’t be able to finish,” Vandenberg said\. *The Chronicle and SFGATE are both owned by Hearst but have separate newsrooms\.* Article continues below this ad Sep 8, 2026 Tessa McLean is the California editor for SFGATE\. She joined the team in 2019, spending four years helming the local section\. She now writes features with a statewide lens, telling stories about the issues, trends and news that matter in the Golden State\. To submit tips, comments or messages about why you love California, please reach out to her at tessa\.mclean@sfgate\.com\.