Town of Tonawanda Hearing Monday August 3 2026 – Data Center Moratorium

We’re very excited to share that the Town of Tonawanda will hold a hearing on Monday August 3, 2026 at 7pm at 2919 Delaware Avenue at the beginning of the regularly scheduled Town Board meeting to vote on a proposed 1-year moratorium on hyperscale data centers above 20MW in size, and to then use the moratorium period develop a zoning amendment to regular data center operations.

The announcement of the hearing came one day prior to Governor Hochul’s Executive Order, and the proposed local moratorium helps cover some of the gaps in the Executive Order, such as the 50MW threshold.

Here is a copy of the Town of Tonawanda’s proposed moratorium law that we received.

Download (PDF, 134KB)

Please join us on Monday August 3 at 7pm at 2919 Delaware Ave to support the passage of the moratorium, and voice any concerns you may have with it.

Typically, members of the public are given 3 minutes to speak during Town of Tonawanda public hearings, and the hearing will be one of the first items on the agenda and the meeting will start promptly at 7pm, so please plan to arrive a little early. Doors to the meeting should open around 6:30.

Clean Air members and organizers have been urging that town officials take this action for several years through our Tonawanda Just Transition Teams – we have grown increasingly alarmed by the impacts of data centers in other communities where we organize, such as in North Tonawanda, and by the quiet ongoing development towards the “Data Innovation Technology Centre” at the Riverview Innovation Tech Campus, formerly Tonawanda Coke.

A moratorium is a sensible short term action to take for local policymakers to develop a zoning amendment – to be clear, though, ultimately Clean Air’s goal is to pivot the planned use of the site from a data center to renewable energy generation and storage, and regardless of whether this moratorium passes or not, we will continue to campaign towards this goal, as well as our other related goals to rein in this new industrial sector.

Learn more about our Erie-Niagara Data Center Campaign here, and our Tonawanda Just Transition Teams here.