Maura Staback believes her late father-in-law would be devastated to know the beloved Archbald park he championed could be flanked by data centers and a power plant.
“I go out and look every single day at the sign with his name on it,” Staback said, describing her view of the Representative Ed Staback Regional Park. “It’s like heartbreaking for our family to think that something that he worked on for so many years and so long could be completely decimated by these.”
Former state Rep. Ed Staback, who died in 2022, represented the then-115th state House District from 1985 until 2012 and spearheaded efforts to develop the recreational space off Eynon Jermyn Road, with the earliest talks of the park dating back to at least the late 1990s. Staback Park began taking shape over two decades ago, expanding next to the Archbald Pothole State Park with walking trails, tennis courts, basketball courts and fields for soccer and baseball. It has become a popular space for recreation for the Midvalley community, but with more than two dozen centers and a natural gas power plant proposed within a mile of the park, industrial development could drastically reshape its landscape.
Maura Staback, daughter-in-law of the late state Rep. Ed Staback, is organizing a “Staback Park Stand Strong 5K” in October to raise money for the Stop Archbald Data Centers movement’s legal fund. (CHAD SEBRING/STAFF PHOTO)
Maura Staback, daughter-in-law of the late state Rep. Ed Staback, is organizing a “Staback Park Stand Strong 5K” in October to raise money for the Stop Archbald Data Centers movement’s legal fund. (CHAD SEBRING/STAFF PHOTO)
Maura Staback, daughter-in-law of the late state Rep. Ed Staback, is organizing a “Staback Park Stand Strong 5K” in October to raise money for the Stop Archbald Data Centers movement’s legal fund. (CHAD SEBRING/STAFF PHOTO)
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Maura Staback, daughter-in-law of the late state Rep. Ed Staback, is organizing a “Staback Park Stand Strong 5K” in October to raise money for the Stop Archbald Data Centers movement’s legal fund. (CHAD SEBRING/STAFF PHOTO)
To help sustain the legal defense against the developments, Staback is organizing the “Staback Park Stand Strong 5K” — an autumn fundraiser to support the Stop Archbald Data Centers’ legal fund, paying for an attorney to represent residents in the courtroom and at numerous hearings. The 5K run and 1.5-mile fun walk will be Oct. 3 at Staback Park on Eynon Jermyn Road. Registration for the 5K is $30, and the walk is $25. Packet pickup and same-day registration will begin at 7:30 a.m., with the 5K and walk at 9 a.m.
Staback chose a fall morning to highlight the park’s natural beauty.
“I just thought, ‘Why don’t we do a 5K through the park?’” she said. “That way everyone could enjoy its beauty and realize what we’re fighting for as a community.”
Archbald has emerged as a data center hotspot in Pennsylvania over the last year-and-a-half. There are 51 proposed data centers in the town across six projects, though a looming seventh proposal plans to add two more data centers in the Valley View Business Park.
Within that hotspot, Staback Park has become a microcosm of the data center debate surrounding the proximity of projects to parks, homes and schools. Developers propose 30 data centers within about a mile of Staback Park, in addition to a data center developer seeking borough approval for a roughly 400-megawatt power plant. The nearest data center campus — the 18-building Project Scott — would be immediately adjacent to Staback Park, lining portions of the park with data centers. Each data center would be up to about 90 feet tall with 154,850-square-foot footprints, according to the project’s conditional use application from December.
The Essential Energy LLC natural gas power plant — a project tied to Kriger Construction Inc. — would be just over two football fields from Staback Park’s entrance. Another Kriger-linked company wants to build a nearly 620,000-square-foot Project Boson data center across the street from the power plant.
Members of the grassroots Stop Archbald Data Centers group and their attorney have gained legal standing at every public hearing surrounding data center proposals and the power plant, including the 14-building Wildcat Ridge Data Center Campus, the seven-building Project Green Mountain campus, Essential Energy and Project Scott.
Attorney Justin Richards addresses representatives of the proposed Wildcat Ridge Data Center Campus during a public hearing at Valley View High School in Archbald, Pa., on Tuesday, Aug. 4, 2026. (ISAAC DIAZ / STAFF PHOTO)
The group is currently fighting Provident Realty Advisors of Dallas, Texas, operating as Archbald I LLC, over the developer’s contention that its Project Scott campus should be automatically approved due to a timing issue.
Working with attorney Justin Richards of Elliott Greenleaf PC in Wilkes-Barre, Stop Archbald Data Centers used its legal fund to intervene against Archbald I while filing its own appeal opposing the project; a Lackawanna County judge ruled Aug. 7 that one of their members, Jack Swingle, has standing to oppose Project Scott’s appeal of its denial. A judge also ruled last month that Stop Archbald Data Centers members challenging the validity of Archbald’s data center zoning ordinance have legal standing to move forward in court.
Stop Archbald Data Centers also spent about $10,000 to hire an environmental health scientist and biostatistician with a doctorate from Harvard University to conduct an air quality and public health assessment, which projected Wildcat Ridge’s 588 diesel generators could produce health damages ranging from $3.3 million to $124 million annually, though the developer disputed those findings.
For Maura Staback, whose hair salon is across the street from Staback Park, the developments are extremely concerning because of their proximity to the park and the nearby Highlands Archbald residential development.
“I can only find the word terrifying,” she said.
She hopes to raise at least $10,000 for the data center opposition group.
“I want to be on the right side of history and doing something good for our community and trying to fight this as much as we possibly can,” she said.
Tamara Misewicz-Healey and her husband, Justin Healey, founded the Stop Archbald Data Centers group in October, growing to nearly 14,000 members on Facebook. A GoFundMe campaign for the group’s legal fund has so far raised more than $57,300.
Misewicz-Healey pointed out how quickly legal fees add up for their group as they navigate applications for six data center projects and a power plant, public hearings that often exceed three hours each and court proceedings.
“It’s critically important for us as a community to get this straightened out,” she said. “I wish we could be raising all these funds for something — building something nice for the community, rather than having to use all of these funds in correcting our zoning.”
Tamara Misewicz-Healey, co-founder of Stop Archbald Data Centers, asks questions during an Archbald Borough Council meeting at Valley View High School on Monday, May 11, 2026. (CHAD SEBRING/STAFF PHOTO).
Fundraising allows them to pay for their attorney and bring in experts to testify, Misewicz-Healey said.
“We try to be as responsible as we can with every decision we make, because we know that we’re limited in funding,” she said. “We’re completely grassroots. We don’t have any nonprofit support or foreign funding support, so we’re really completely funded by community members, and it is limited funds.”
Many of their donations are $10, $20 or maybe $100, Misewicz-Healey said.
Even if Archbald denies applications for data centers, based on other communities across the state, Misewicz-Healey believes developers will appeal the denials to court, potentially drawing out the process for years. Archbald’s legal fight could inform decisions elsewhere in the state, she said, adding she constantly hears, “All eyes are on Archbald Borough.”
“Thankfully, we just have such an amazing community that is just passionate about this and dedicated,” she said. “When a lot of people care, and a lot of people contribute, thankfully, it adds up, but the fundraising needs to continue if we want to continue to have that legal representation and continue this battle.”
To sign up for the event, visit runsignup.com/Race/PA/Archbald/StandStrong5kRunWalk. To sponsor the 5K, email maurastaback@yahoo.com.