Local
Sutton Data Center Idea Originated with Town Official, Not Kraft Group, Records Show
Public meeting videos reveal that Sutton's Select Board discussed a co-location data center proposal over a year before the Kraft Group's plan became public, raising questions about transparency and the town's role in courting the project.
SUTTON â The controversial proposal by a Kraft Group company to build a massive data center complex in this small Worcester County town was not the first time the idea surfaced. More than a year ago, a Sutton town official publicly raised the concept of a co-location facility on a large parcel of land owned by a Kraft Group packaging company, according to videos of Select Board meetings reviewed by the Globe.
The earlier discussions, which took place in public sessions of the Select Board, show that town officials were actively encouraging the Kraft Group to develop the land on the north side of town long before residents packed a meeting Tuesday night to express shock and outrage over the proposal.
It remains unclear exactly when the Kraft Group began pursuing the data center idea. At a Select Board meeting in December, a representative for the company said they had not formally presented any plan to Sutton officials. The project was discussed again at Tuesday's Select Board meeting, where residents voiced strong opposition.
The revelation that local officials were involved in early conversations about a data center could intensify scrutiny of the project and raise questions about how much residents were told before the proposal became public. Sutton, with about 9,700 residents, sits roughly 10 miles south of Worcester and has become ground zero in a growing regional debate over the siting of large-scale data centers, which require significant energy and water resources and have drawn opposition in communities across Massachusetts.
The Kraft Group, owned by Robert Kraft, also owns the New England Patriots. The company's packaging subsidiary owns the land in question. The proposed facility would be a co-location data center, a type of campus where multiple companies house servers and networking equipment.
At Tuesday's meeting, resident Max Provo was among those demanding that the Select Board immediately halt the proposal. The meeting drew a large crowd of residents who said they were blindsided by the scale of the project.
The earlier Select Board discussions were captured on video and posted publicly, but they did not appear to generate widespread attention at the time. The videos show town officials discussing the potential for a data center on the Kraft-owned parcel as part of broader economic development conversations.
The discrepancy between the public record and residents' reactions this week underscores a gap in communication between town government and the community, critics say. It also highlights the often opaque process by which large energy-intensive projects are pitched to small towns, where officials may see tax revenue benefits while residents worry about environmental impacts, strain on infrastructure, and quality of life.
Sutton officials have not yet scheduled a formal vote on the proposal. The Select Board is expected to continue discussions in the coming weeks as more residents learn about the project and its potential effects on the community.