EL PASO, Tx., June 22, 2026: The El Paso City Council will be discussing two items during tomorrow’s city council meeting regarding datacenters. The first item seeks to amend the city’s state legislative agenda to include support for Texas Governor Greg Abbott’s call for state regulators to ensure that Texas utility ratepayers are protected from rising utility costs due to the datacenters being built in Texas. In a June 10th letter to the Public Utility Commission (PUC), Abbott tasked the utility regulator “to ensure everyday Texans are not burdened” by the datacenters.
The item was put on tomorrow’s agenda by Art Fierro, Alejandra Chávez and Ivan Niño. The three, who are facing reelection campaigns in November, voted last week against opening discussions with META over the datacenter it is building in Northeast El Paso.
The city’s State Legislative Agenda for the 90th Session outlines the city’s priorities for the legislative session that begins in January. The agenda, adopted in February, asks the city’s state elected officials to “support legislation that “strengthens” the “City’s Retirement Systems” and opposes legislation that “results in the loss of City’s revenues or negatively impacts the City’s authority to generate revenues,” among several other priorities. Among the other priorities includes funds for roads, the airport, funding for water-related infrastructure, public safety and other “core municipal services.”
Included among the requests is a $25 million appropriation request for the Deck Plaza, which would include other funds from local, state and federal sources. The city also wants the state senate to evaluate datacenters and water supplies, according to the agenda adopted by the city in February.
Tomorrow’s discussion in support of Abbott’s call for protecting ratepayers from the costs associated with datacenters, the item, if approved tomorrow, will direct the city manager and the city attorney to ensure that El Paso Electric is included in Abbott’s directive.
El Paso Electric is not part of The Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT) which encompasses about 75% of the electrical power grid in Texas. Abbott’s letter mentioned ERCOT and did not include El Paso’s electric utility, although the local utility is also regulated by the PUC, like ERCOT.
Community Benefits Agreement
The second item related to datacenters that the city council will be discussing tomorrow is a Community Benefits Agreement (CBA) between the city and META. A CBA is a contract between a developer and community organizations. It usually outlines specific amenities and investments that a developer agrees to, to ensure that local residents benefit from the development. A CBA is a private contract that can hold the developer accountable to the community.
The key priorities outlined in the agenda item include addressing “environmental protections, financial commitments, utility infrastructure improvements, ratepayer protection, workforce development initiatives, support for the Advanced Training Center, and community accountability measures, including safeguards related to water and electric utility resources.”
The proposed agreement would include a provision for filling 300 proposed jobs for the datacenter by El Pasoans. The agenda item calls for the city manager to continue public discussions about META’s El Paso datacenter facilitated by an independent moderator that will include participants like “the Mayor, the City Attorney, representatives from El Paso Water, El Paso Electric, the El Paso Chamber, GEPAR, Meta Platforms, Inc., a resident representative, and an environmental advocate, to assist in the development of the final Community Benefits Agreement.”
Should the city council approve the item, a draft agreement will be presented to the council in 45 days.
City officials want META to commit to improve water service that would guarantee the datacenter’s water long-term water needs while improving leaving more potable water in the region’s aquifers for residents. Officials also want META to assist in “funding sewer infrastructure for 214 homes located approximately one mile from the data center.”
They also want META to commit to solar energy and battery storage to help reduce pollution and fund xeriscaping projects to help with air pollution in the area.
The city also seeks to protect utility ratepayers through the CBA and ensure META commits to 300 permanent jobs, instead of the 50 included in the 380 Agreement. The jobs should be prioritized for El Pasoans, according to the agenda item. They also want META to commit to establishing an advanced training center in partnership with Workforce Solutions and El Paso Community College (EPCC).
This item was put on the city council’s agenda for tomorrow by city representatives Cynthia Boyar Trejo and Deanna Maldonado-Rocha. Neither face reelection in November, but Boyar Trejo is facing a recall launched against her for recent vote on META.
Two community groups; Amanecer People’s Project and Sembrando Esperanza have emerged as the two leading groups opposing META’s datacenter.
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