The data center fight in Aberdeen, South Dakota
As of October 25, 2026, Aberdeen, South Dakota has a data center moratorium in force (action taken Jul 20, 2026; documented end date 2026-11-18).
Status is derived, not stored — a pause with a documented end date flips to Expired on its own — and the source is right next to the claim.
Status today
Resolution 26-07-04R, adopted 7-0, is a temporary moratorium on city permits and licenses for construction, development or operation of data centers; pending applications held without review. Automatically repealed Nov 18, 2026, or earlier when a data center zoning ordinance takes effect. Council has set an Oct 19 hearing on a resolution to extend it (reported through Jul 1, 2027); not yet voted as of Oct 11. Read the published notice, not the resolution PDF.
SourceNews
read 2026-10-11
An expiry date is the earliest a pause could have ended — extensions are common, so confirm with the clerk before citing it.
What to do next
- Questions to ask at the hearing — force specific answers onto the record.
- Estimate the impact — electricity, water, and rate pressure for any facility size in South Dakota.
- Model CBA clauses — copy-paste language communities have actually won.
- South Dakota briefing — rates, grid carbon, PUC contacts, and every fight in the state.
Nearby in South Dakota
- Minnehaha County (150 mi) — Under Reviewterm not documented
- Lincoln County (165 mi) — Defeatedterm not documented
- Yankton County (187 mi) — Enactedexpires 2027-01-21
All 4 tracked actions in South Dakota are on the state page.
As of August 2026 (2m ago) · changes weekly — re-check before citing
Illustrative rather than exhaustive — dozens of localities churn weekly, and this tracks the ones we have read a source for. **Each row carries its own provenance.** Rows showing a verification date link to the ordinance, the enacting body's own page, or a datable report of the vote, and were read on that date. Rows marked *unverified* came from bulk compilation and have not been checked against a primary source — the locality, the year, and the status may all be off. Verify one of those with the town clerk before citing it as precedent. **Expiry is derived, not asserted.** A row with a documented end date flips to *Expired* on its own once that date passes. A time-limited moratorium whose start date was never documented keeps showing as enacted — that is a known gap, not a claim that it is still in force. Moratoriums are also routinely extended, so an expiry date is the earliest it could have ended, not proof that it did.
Part of the U.S. data center moratorium tracker — open data, CC BY 4.0.