Microsoft data center

Four Republican St. Joseph County Council members are asking Amazon Web Services to voluntarily pay into a fund that would give homeowners property tax relief, despite the council granting the tech giant an abatement in August 2024.

Although Microsoft isn't seeking a property tax break, St. Joseph County economic development director Bill Schalliol says the county is still asking the tech giant to pay for new water and sewer lines to spur growth in Granger beyond the data center.

Now that construction is underway on Microsoft’s Granger data center, St. Joseph County officials are promising to keep an eye on disruption to the surrounding community.

We Make Indiana, the faith-based interdenominational nonprofit, has asked Microsoft to enter into a Fair Share Agreement pledging part of their Granger data center profits to fund a wide range of community needs.

Microsoft will soon start building a data center in Granger northeast of Capital Avenue and Cleveland Road.

Microsoft on Tuesday will host an open house at South Bend's Century Center, with information stations on issues related to its plans to soon start building its Granger data center.

The new limits on low-frequency sounds that industrial operations can emit won't apply to Amazon's data center because its building permits have been issued but they will apply to the data center that Microsoft will soon start building in Granger.

St. Joseph County Council President Bryan Tanner says he sympathizes with people living north of the Toll Road who might want to complain about low-frequency sound but it will not be possible to accurately measure sound from the data center when the Toll Road makes so much noise itself.

Of four Indiana data centers studied, only property values close to Amazon's data center near New Carlisle increased more than values countywide.

Now that Microsoft has announced a national policy of forgoing local property tax breaks for its data centers, four of the St. Joseph County Council's five Republicans have sent Amazon Web Services a letter asking it to renegotiate the 35-year, $4 billion property tax abatement it's receiving from the county for its New Carlisle data center under development.