Prince William County announced it’s now home to five million square feet of data center space.
The new centers are popping up in the western portion of the county, many of them opening with little or no fanfare, opting to keep their locations as private as possible. So far, we’ve seen data center spring up off Prince William Parkway near Gainesville, off Route 55 in Haymarket, as well as new construction for data centers occurring now on Hornbaker Road near Manassas, as well as near the Manassas Regional Airport.
To date, Prince William County’s Department of Economic Development has logged 41 projects that have invested $9 billion in capital investment and created over 1,170 highly-skilled jobs, as well as bringing hundreds of construction jobs and indirect jobs into the county, according to a press release.
Data centers are popular among local leaders because, while they employ few people, they generate large tax revenue for county coffers and often require upgrades of new computer equipment to service their clients, which is also taxed. The new revenue not only benefits county government projects such as transportation but also schools.
“I believe these data centers can provide a good taxable revenue source. Surrounding counties, such as Loudoun, tax these data centers and generate significant revenues that benefit the community and help offset pressure to increase individual homeowner’s property tax. Loudoun generates a very significant amount of revenue and you see them investing that revenue directly into their schools. That has an impact on performance,” Prince William County School Board Chairman Babur Lateef told Potomac Local.
From her seat on the Prince William County Board of Supervisors, Potomac District Supervisor Maureen Caddigan has criticized data centers for using up too much land in the county that could be used for other types of development, to include office space which would bring more jobs to the region.
In April, fellow Supervisors in a tie vote killed a proposal from At-large Chairman Corey Stewart to hike the tax rate paid by data centers from $1.50 per $100 of assessed property value to $2.50 per $100 assessed value over the next five years. If it had passed, it would have generated more than $2 million more for county schools, said Stewart.
Neighboring Loudoun County’s data center tax rate was set at $4.20 per $100 of assessed value at the time the Prince William County Supervisors killed its proposed tax hike. It has more data centers than anywhere in the world.
