Palm Springs City Council To Consider Temporary Ban On Data Centers

PALM SPRINGS, CA — The Palm Springs City Council will consider a temporary ban on data centers during a council meeting next week.

City staff recommends councilmembers to implement an urgency ordinance that will ban "accepting, processing or approving any applications, permits, entitlements or other approvals related to data centers while the city evaluates such uses as part of the ongoing citywide zoning code update" for an initial period of 45 days, according to a staff report.

The ban will give council enough time to update the city's zoning code as it does not provide specific regulations or policies applicable to data center uses and developments.

City staff outlined various concerns regarding data centers in the staff report, including environmental impacts, such as water and electricity issues, and relatively low-employment at data centers.

If the moratorium is adopted, Palm Springs would be one of few Coachella Valley cities attempting to ban data centers following Indio, Desert Hot Springs and Coachella.

The meeting will take place Wednesday at 5:30 p.m. at 3200 E. Tahquitz Canyon Way.