Festus City Council Members Propose 12-Month Pause on $6 Billion Data Center Project
Council members Carl Weakley (Ward 1), Dan Moore (Ward 3), and Rick Belleville (Ward 4) are supporting a proposed 12-month moratorium, essentially putting the project on hold while the city and residents take a closer look at the potential impacts.
According to Mayor Sam Richards, the proposal is expected to be discussed at the July 27 council meeting.
CRG and The Festus Data Center
Back in 2025, CRG of St. Louis announced plans to develop a hyperscale data center on nearly 400 acres along Highway 67 in Festus.
CRG is the development arm of Clayco and estimates the project will cost around $6 billion. CRG would develop the site, and then a separate data center company would operate it. As of now, that operator has not been publicly identified.
That uncertainty is one of the reasons council members say they want to slow things down.
Why do they want a pause?
The biggest concerns I've heard from Jefferson County residents—especially people in Festus—are pretty consistent:
Water usage
Electricity demand
Community health concerns
Potential impacts on nearby property values
Environmental effects, including wildlife and farm animals
The idea behind the moratorium isn't to kill the project although, many would like that to be the case.
It's to give the city more time to investigate these concerns and give residents a better opportunity to have their voices heard.
Councilman Rick Belleville summed it up this way:
"I'm asking that we pause on the data center, not cancel it, with a 12-month moratorium. The council members would have time to discuss this fully. If we discuss all the concerns before the one-year moratorium is up, then we can move forward."
What would the moratorium actually do?
If approved, the moratorium would temporarily pause the acceptance, processing, and issuance of permits related to hyperscale data centers and battery energy storage systems.
That extra time would allow the city to review areas including:
Zoning
Fire safety
Building standards
Water infrastructure
Wastewater capacity
Electrical infrastructure
Development standards
It's an attempt to hit the pause button, not stop the project forever. Ideally this will buy more time for additional review and public discussion.
CRG responds
CRG President Chris McKee responded to the proposal with the following statement:
"We're aware of Councilman Belleville's stated intention to bring forward a moratorium proposal, and we respect the council's role in reviewing this project.
Since June, we've put forward a substantially smaller plan shaped by community feedback, and we've been answering residents' questions directly through FestusForward.com.
We look forward to continuing that conversation with the council and the community through the city's established process.
Because the proposal hasn't been formally introduced, we're not going to speculate on specifics, but our commitment to getting this project right for Festus is unchanged."
Community webinar announced
Near the end of Monday's work session, City Administrator Benjamin DeClue announced that CRG has scheduled a community webinar.
The webinar is planned for:
July 23 @ 6:00–7:00 p.m.
Not everyone was happy with the announcement that this would be virtual.
Several residents expressed that they would rather have an in-person public meeting held in Festus instead of an online webinar.
DeClue also said he wasn't sure whether the webinar would count as one of the public meetings CRG is required to hold under the city's ordinance governing data center projects.
In Summary
At this point, the proposal isn't about cancelling the data center.
The council members supporting the moratorium want to temporarily pause the approval process, give residents more opportunities to ask questions, and review whether additional safeguards or changes should be made before construction moves forward.
Meanwhile, CRG says it's continuing to move forward with the project and remains committed to working through the city's approval process.
There are attorneys involved, discussions are ongoing, and it's clear this debate is far from over.
We'll continue following the story as new information becomes available.
For more local news, keep checking The Jeffco Journal. For project-specific information from the developer, visit FestusForward.com.