LOUDOUN COUNTY, Va. — Data centers have become one of the most divisive local issues in the country, and few places illustrate the conflict more sharply than Loudoun County. The facilities have delivered billions of dollars in private investment and helped lower local tax rates. But residents living near the server farms say the benefits have come with noise, sprawling development, heavy demands on electricity and water, and too little public information about projects negotiated behind closed doors. The dispute is increasingly crossing party lines. Juli Briskman, a Democratic member of the Loudoun County Board of Supervisors, is challenging fellow Democrat Phyllis Randall for county chair in next year’s primary. Briskman has pushed to slow additional development, while Randall has defended the industry’s contribution to county finances, calling data centers a “double-edged sword” for residents. Briskman said her concerns date to 2020, when the board began considering proposals to convert residential and flex-industrial properties into data centers. “I feel like I have been singing this song for a while, and now all of a sudden everyone’s grabbing my music and singing along with me,” she said. The political realignment is also visible among residents. Kasey Hatch, an information-technology infrastructure engineer who uses artificial intelligence in her work, lives near the Vantage VA2 facility in Sterling. The center is powered by eight natural-gas turbines, which neighbors say produce a persistent low rumble and high-pitched whine. Hatch said she and her strongly Republican cousin have rarely agreed politically. Data centers are an exception. At public hearings, Hatch and Nusheen Farahani are among women organizing against the facility. Farahani said their group includes people with different political ideologies. “I’m a liberal and I’m a Democrat, and the people that are in our little team … not all of them are liberals or Democrats,” she said. Hatch created a public dashboard to display noise readings near VA2. The effort reflects a broader demand from residents for independent information about facilities whose impacts can be difficult to evaluate before construction begins. A survey of nearly 1,600 adults conducted by The Economist and YouGov found that roughly two-thirds opposed building new data centers in their communities. Political scientists and community researchers say the opposition combines practical concerns about land use, noise, utility costs and environmental impacts with deeper anxiety over artificial intelligence and the loss of public control over technology. The financial argument for data centers is substantial. Loudoun County reported approximately $1.2 billion in data center property tax revenue during fiscal year 2026 — about 39% of its overall budget. County officials say the revenue has helped reduce the real property tax rate by roughly 30% over the past decade, while vehicle taxes have also declined. The industry says those benefits support schools, services and taxpayers. Dan Diorio of the Data Center Coalition said lower property and vehicle taxes put money directly back into residents’ pockets. But the facilities require enormous amounts of electricity, and cooling systems can consume significant quantities of water. The scale of new projects has also intensified concerns about whether utilities, roads and neighboring communities can absorb the growth. Transparency has become a central flashpoint. A study led by Eric Bonds, a sociology professor at the University of Mary Washington, found that nondisclosure agreements had been signed in 25 of 31 Virginia localities with an existing, approved or proposed data center. Critics say those agreements make it harder for the public to understand how major land-use and infrastructure decisions are made. John Stephenson, a senior vice president at Vantage Data Centers, said the company should have engaged residents earlier on noise and air-quality concerns. He said the company had not expected the level of opposition because it had been building data centers for years. The backlash is not limited to Loudoun. Frederick County, Maryland, has frozen new data center development while the state completes a cost-benefit analysis. Yet construction is already underway on Quantum Frederick, a planned 2,100-acre campus near Adamstown, on land formerly occupied by an aluminum plant. Steve Black, who owns a tree nursery about a mile from the project, has sought public records about the development and helped lead a nonprofit that won a lawsuit giving residents access to county documents. He said the county is caught between a powerful developer and residents who feel ignored. “When I have to go to some council meeting and stay there till midnight … that is all on my time,” Black said. In Wisconsin, residents successfully organized against a proposed $12 billion hyperscale facility near DeForest after learning that local officials had negotiated with the developer privately. The project was abandoned this year. Across the country, governments that once competed to attract data centers with tax incentives are imposing moratoriums, tightening regulations or requiring developers to prove that their projects will benefit the public. Virginia Gov. Abigail Spanberger recently signed an executive order seeking tighter limits on new development, after previously expressing qualified support for expansion. For Loudoun residents, the county’s experience has become a warning about the consequences of rapid growth. The Board of Supervisors recently voted to pause new data center applications, though many projects already in the pipeline cannot be reversed. “We are the case study, not just for the region, but for the nation,” Briskman said. The fight is now shaping elections and alliances as residents weigh the tax revenue against the costs they say have been shifted onto neighborhoods. For some voters, the issue has become less about party identity than who gets a meaningful say when corporate projects reshape a community. “I have become a single-issue person,” Black said. “Some people are Democrats that I’m supporting and some are Republicans, and it no longer matters to me.”