The longer the wait and the more earnest the anticipation of a moment, the more anticlimactic its eventual arrival tends to be. Desperation can inject drama into the most predictable plot, but a conclusion easily foreseen fizzles even when it produces the desired outcome.
The nine-episode conditional use hearing for the Wildcat Ridge Data Center Campus application ended Wednesday with a last, pathetic gasp from the applicant’s chief advocate and a jubilant expression of relief from the proposal’s defiant hostages.
It’s all over now but the voting. Considering the epically pathetic case the developers’ team cobbled together over the past seven months, Archbald Borough Council has no sane choice but to reject the application and prepare for the inevitable court battle to come.
Council had 45 days from Wednesday to vote on the application. The same number of seconds would have been sufficient.
From the beginning, attorney Edmund Campbell Jr. and the clown car of “experts” representing Brooklyn-based Cornell Realty Management LLC made an airtight case against the application, offering few concrete details and copious contradictory testimony while making promises of prosperity as believable as bringing a Trader Joe’s to tiny Archbald.
His voice shaky at the start of Wednesday’s finale, Campbell argued that his clients have bargained in “good faith” and that council is bound to abide by the zoning “overlays” passed last November. Never mind that said overlays were ghostwritten by the developers in quiet collaboration with council members who are no longer in office, or that Campbell filed motions seeking the recusals of the entire current council.
Council formally rejected the ridiculous recusal motions at the start of the hearing, setting up the absurd circumstance of Campbell pleading with a council he sought to sideline. Cornell’s version of “good faith” is, “Vote our way or don’t vote.”
Prominent citizens who signed up to testify months ago missed Wednesday’s hearing. State Sen. Rosemary Brown, R-40, Middle Smithfield Twp., was absent. Her challenger, Democrat Brian Wrightson of Archbald, was there but did not testify.
No one expected MAGA Republican U.S. Rep. Rob Bresnahan to appear at the hearing, but an ad his campaign debuted last week was a topic of bafflement and consternation among many in the crowd. Titled “Archbald,” the spot features Bresnahan saying:
“Northeast Pennsylvania is our home, but to Big Data, we’re just land and dollar signs. Archbald fought back and won. That’s why I wrote the bill that makes data centers get local approval before construction and protects our communities from billion-dollar corporations that try to fight us. No secret deals. No taxpayer handouts. Local control. This is our home. We get to decide.”
Amen to that last bit, but what Bresnahan means by “Archbald fought back and won” is a mystery. The borough remains the target of at least six invasive data center proposals, none of which has been decided and all of which may be resolved in the courts.
Archbald hasn’t “won” anything. Yet.
The ad inadvertently highlights how absent from the process Bresnahan has been. The congressman has never attended a data center hearing in Archbald, or anywhere else I’m aware of. Maybe someone on his staff told him Archbald “won” and, having no personal experience, he assumed it was true. If that’s what happened, Rob should fire that staffer, or give the staffer a raise, depending on your perspective.
Citing an August financial disclosure, CBS News reported on Thursday that Bresnahan owns millions of dollars’ worth of data center-related stock, much of it in “billion-dollar corporations that try to fight us.” He introduced a bill promoting “local control” of data center development, but so far it has gone nowhere, much like his entirely performative bill to ban congressional stock trading.
Because I regularly interact face-to-face with Bresnahan’s constituents, I can report with certainty that the “Archbald” ad backfired spectacularly among the people actually fighting the industrialized annihilation of the borough.
Scranton Mayor Paige Cognetti, Bresnahan’s Democratic opponent in the 8th Congressional District race, attended four of the Wildcat Ridge hearings but was not in the Valley View High School auditorium Wednesday evening. It was a huge missed opportunity for her campaign, and her absence disappointed many who were there.
In a Friday email to council and borough Manager Dan Markey, Cognetti said she missed the hearing due to a prior commitment that couldn’t be rescheduled and asked that the following testimony be added to the hearing record:
“I have had the honor of attending four Wildcat Ridge hearings since the beginning of the year, witnessing firsthand both the extraordinary fight of the residents of Archbald, Eynon, Jessup, and from across Lackawanna County, and the appalling performances of the representatives of the project’s funders, who to this day are still hiding critical information, identities, and ultimate goals.
“As the mother of two young children, I have been heartened by the tenacity of the Stop Archbald Data Centers organization in their mission to block projects that would overwhelm their hometown and deteriorate their quality of life, not to mention endanger the surrounding region’s health, air, and water.
“As Mayor of Scranton, I remain grateful for the opportunity to learn how to navigate the suspicious tactics of the project’s funders to better inform our city’s own fight against similarly proposed projects in Newton and Ransom townships, which loom large above the Scranton city line and threaten to overtake our stormwater management systems and ruin our residents’ quality of life. Additionally, the buildup of projects in Archbald and other places in Lackawanna County would likely rely on an expansion of PPL’s infrastructure that cuts across West Mountain above Scranton, an expansion that we fear would cause destructive water damage to our residents, businesses, roads, and storm mitigation infrastructure.
“And as a candidate for U.S. Congress, I have been inspired by the people of Archbald, who continue to set an extraordinary example for what a community can do in the face of predatory development. Your determination and resolve have inspired and educated others all across NEPA, and even across the country.
“I praise the Archbald Borough Council members for refusing to be bullied by the greed of others. Your steadfastness in standing up to the reprehensible behavior of the project’s legal team and their request for your recusal is a testament to your courage and concern for those you faithfully serve.
“Yes, there may be data center projects that deserve consideration, for example, next to the nuclear facility in Berwick, or at the site of a decommissioned coal plant in Homer City. But only after rigorous vetting, the host community’s across-the-board approvals, full transparency, commitments to use local union labor, commitments to provide energy without raising costs on residents, and binding community benefits.
“However, at this moment in time, there are absolutely zero projects in Lackawanna County and in all of Pennsylvania’s 8th Congressional District, that should be allowed to move forward. I say shut them all down. Transparency has been lacking at every turn, with ominous non-disclosure agreements inundating permit applications and ensuing hearings, shrouding the identities of the developers, the LLCs, and the AI companies involved. The public has a right to absolute transparency when it comes to those who intend to invade their neighborhoods.
“I sternly warn that we will never welcome these modern-day robber barons looking to make a quick buck to the detriment of our communities. Honestly, they should have packed it in months ago. And that includes the Wildcat project and every other Up Valley and Mid Valley proposal. To the project developers, I implore you to recognize that this community clearly does not want what you are selling. For the benefit of yourselves, your time, and your money, if for nothing else, please – GET OUT.
“Thank you, Archbald Borough officials, for allowing me this opportunity to stand with all of you in defense of our entire region’s quality of life.”
If the congressman would like to make a statement to the people of Archbald between now and Nov. 3, this space is available.
Lackawanna County Commissioner Bill Gaughan attended every installment of the Wildcat Ridge hearing and took the bully pulpit on Wednesday with customary gusto. Gaughan, whom I’ve taken to calling “BFK” owing to his fiery (if sometimes overly verbose) oratory against invasive data center development, got a standing ovation for standing up in defense of his constituents.
I confess feeling a fleeting pang of pity for Campbell, whose summation was sandwiched between Gaughan’s speech and the closing argument of Stop Archbald Data Centers attorney Justin Richards, who has mopped the floor with Campbell and Co. from the outset.
“All we can ask, and all we do ask, is that you exercise your common sense,” Richards implored council. “You rely on the record before you, rely only on what you have been presented with in these hearings, and you reach the only conclusion that will safeguard the health, safety and welfare of these people, your people: Deny this application.”
Fittingly, Tamara Misewicz-Healey had the last word. The wife, mother of three, industrial hygienist and co-founder of Stop Archbald Data Centers has been an especially sharp thorn in Campbell’s side. The sing-song cadence of her voice and professional expertise clearly cut him to the bone. She knows it, and pours it on accordingly.
“We demand the integrity of our town. We demand you actually follow your own rules, your own zoning, and your own comprehensive plan, and listen to the people of this town,” Misewicz-Healey told council. “Because without the people, you don’t have a town.”
It’s all over but the voting.
CHRIS KELLY, The Times-Tribune columnist, anticipates unusually heavy voter turnout on Nov. 3. Contact the writer: ckelly@scrantontimes.com; @cjkink on X; Chris Kelly, The Times-Tribune on Facebook; and @chriskellyink on Bluesky.