Three years ago, my husband and I moved to our retirement home. A year later, this turmoil began. When a billion-dollar company and another multi-million dollar company come charging into your community with unlimited wealth and proceed to turn your world upside down, it truly is tragic for anyone, but especially so for my senior community of Heritage Hunt, with 3,500 people and an average age of 75, located only an hour west of Washington, D.C., our nation’s capital.
With the advent of data centers to make our world connected at intergalactic speeds, people do not realize what the adverse effects of a proposed data center alley can do to the community in which they encroach: the destruction of our environment and wildlife, the pressure on our overtaxed electrical grid; the polluted air with particulate matter from diesel-fired, backup generators; the depletion of our watershed; potential 24/7 noise from rooftop A/C systems on hyper-scale buildings standing 90 feet tall and beyond; and, most importantly, the disrespect to the thousands of Civil War soldiers buried on the hallowed grounds of the Manassas National Battlefield Park adjacent to this proposed large data center alley, the same data center alley adjacent to my retirement community. Even our Conway Robinson State Forest abuts this project.
Many of us seniors here have banded together in opposition. Letters have been written, phone calls have been made, and offices have been frequented by every local, state, and federal elected official to little avail. The political maneuvering is profound and unprecedented, especially non-replies to Virginia Freedom of Information Act requests. One after the other, rezoning and special use permits were approved for even more nearby monstrosities during the darkest days of COVID under Non-Disclosure Agreements by the majority of our elected County Board of Supervisors.
Where are the integrity, morals, insight, and foresight of what they are proposing for our county? Why have numerous studies not been ordered in advance of this new venture when there has been nothing but citizen outcry, along with the disapproval of over 30 environmental groups, county commissions, our own county offices, and even disapproval by Ken Burns, filmmaker of the famous Civil War miniseries.
We, seniors, have been around the block a few times, as they say, and we know it is a travesty that the almighty dollar has taken precedence over our cultural heritage and the protection of mother earth for our progeny and their progeny.
There are many forms of elder abuse, and I believe that corporate America has just established a new version of the textbooks by setting their sites on land adjacent to 3,500 of us seniors, causing undue stress on our health and welfare for the past 18 months with much more elder abuse to come if this project goes forward.
I just want to cry because no one is listening to me, because no one is showing any foresight because there is no undoing the devastation once done. I cry for all those who will never know the historic and beautiful Prince William County in the Commonwealth of Virginia that I have known for the past 47 years.
I will always stand by the Virginia State Seal, Sic Semper Tyrannis: Sic semper tyrannis is a Latin phrase meaning “thus always to tyrants.” In contemporary parlance, it means tyrannical leaders will inevitably be overthrown.
The phrase also suggests that bad but justified outcomes should, or eventually will, befall tyrants.
Elizabeth Martorana
Gainesville
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