The deep-pocketed developers behind the Prince William Digital Gateway, the massive data center complex at the edge of Manassas National Battlefield Park, just don’t know when to stop.
First, a three-judge panel in the Virginia Court of Appeals upheld the lower court’s ruling that the hasty rezoning vote was illegal. Then, the Board of Supervisors unanimously voted to withdraw the county’s support for any further appeals in the case, stopping the use of nearly $2 million in taxpayer money. Then Compass, one of the two firms behind the original proposal, announced that it would not exercise its right to appeal to the state’s highest court.
We’d hoped that QTS, the remaining developer, would see the wisdom in also standing down. We were cautiously optimistic that our five-year fight against this monstrosity of a proposal — 37 data center buildings requiring 14 on-site electrical substations and consuming enough energy to power more than 2 million homes — would be at its end.
We were wrong.
At the conclusion of the 30-day window for filings, we learned that QTS is filing a petition of appeal on the matter to the Supreme Court of Virginia.
And so, the fight continues — thanks tosupporters like you.
When I wrote to the Trust’s membership last month about the status of our two lawsuits against data center developers and the counties who approved their plans through flawed and illegal processes, I said that we “have them on the run.” They are getting desperate and are down to their last lines of defense – but they still have vast resources at their disposal to keep up the fight.
And so, our long campaign continues. We cannot surrender now, when the stakes have never been higher.
Help Keep the Fight Alive — Make a Gift Today!
Please consider making a gift to support the Trust’s advocacy efforts, to keep us in the fight as we prepare to stand before Virginia's highest court. Doing so helps ensure that we have the resources to continue the highest level of opposition we can muster – without sacrificing our ability to protect a single acre of the hallowed ground we are currently in negotiations to secure.
This isn’t the outcome we hoped for, but we will continue the fight.
‘Til the Battle Is Won – on the field or in the courts,
David N. Duncan
President
American Battlefield Trust