MONROVIA — Google has offered to pay $12 million for wastewater treatment plant (WWTP) upgrades in Monrovia if the town will end its effort to annex land east of the town’s limits, according to an internal email leaked on social media Tuesday.
At the council’s March meeting, the body voted 3-2 to annex 890 acres of land east of the town, which encompasses all of Google’s data center campus and extends out to Keller Hill Heights. Councilmen Philip Fowler and Ryan Marsh voted against the measure, with Fowler expressing concerns of pushback from Morgan County.
Council president and vice president Tammy Everett and Carol Youngblood, respectively, defended the annexation project, arguing it would bring the town a great deal of additional revenue.
Following the March meeting, the county transferred ownership of about 600 acres of Google property to its redevelopment commission (RDC) in a 10-year lease-back agreement, thereby shielding it from annexation efforts, per Indiana Code 36-4-3-4.3, which expressly prohibits an RDC-owned property from being annexed “without obtaining the consent of the county executive.”
Nevertheless, Monrovia has continued to pursue the annexation process, holding public meetings in June allowing impacted residents to learn more information. If the town moves forward with the process, the 145 parcels included in the annexation plan could become part of Monrovia as early as the first quarter of next year.
But despite the county’s effort to shield Google from annexation, the company still wants Monrovia to halt its plans.
On June 23, the town council held a closed-door executive session, where it met with the “Project Louie Team,” the county’s code name for Google’s data center project.
During this meeting, representatives from Google requested the town end the annexation effort. In exchange, the company would pay for the town to receive WWTP improvements.
“We value our relationship with the community of Monrovia and are committed to continuing partnerships with the town on pathways that foster growth while ensuring local Monrovians do not incur tax increases for necessary and important municipal improvements,” reads a leaked email from Google addressed to Everett, the town council and town staff.
“To that end,” the email continues, “We are pleased to outline a proposed partnership regarding the town’s wastewater infrastructure that will deliver immediate upgrades and long-term financial benefits to the town of Monrovia.”
The three-point offer begins by offering to increase Monrovia’s WWTP capacity from 300,000 gallons of water per day to approximately 600,000 gallons per day, an upgrade that would cost $12 million — a cost Google is willing to pay.
In addition to paying for that, Google also offered to cover the costs associated with upgrading the town’s existing sewer system, as well as upgrading the Homestead Lift Station.
Google goes on to say that following the completion of these upgrades, the data center campus will become a customer of the Monrovia sewer facility, paying monthly for its services at the town’s standard sewer rates and tariffs as adopted by town ordinance.
“To move forward together and unlock these substantial infrastructure investments, this proposal is contingent upon the town agreeing to end its current annexation process,” the email reads. “By clearing this hurdle collaboratively, we can focus our collective efforts on building a mutually beneficial future.”
Google’s offer does have a deadline, with the company requesting the town accept terms by Friday, July 3.
“We are being heavily pressured not to annex,” Everett told The Correspondent on Tuesday.
Everett said that the council asked Google during the June executive session why they did not want to be annexed, but she said the company’s representatives did not have an answer, other than that the county did not want Monrovia to annex Google.
“We’d be stupid not to annex them,” Everett said, declining to comment further.
Last week’s executive session and this week’s email are just another chapter in continued the continued animosity between Monrovia and the county.
Last year, the town attempted to establish an exclusive wastewater territory on land that included Google’s data center, but the county intervened with the Indiana Utility Regulatory Commission (IURC). The IURC ultimately sided with the county, preventing Monrovia from gaining exclusive wastewater rights at the data center.
And last month, Morgan County commissioner Bryan Collier lobbied for the county RDC to sign a lease agreement with Google to ensure the data center land was protected from Monrovia’s annexation effort.
“(The lease agreement) allows the county to secure a financial benefit of Google’s project by securing the county’s jurisdiction over the project for receipt of the payments,” Collier said at the RDC meeting.
