Menomonie annexes 324 acres and rezones for proposed data center developement
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By LeAnn R. Ralph
MENOMONIE — The Menomonie City Council has approved annexing 324 acres along county Highway B from the Town of Red Cedar and rezoning the acreage to Restricted Industrial for the proposed development of a data center.
The property is located between 650th Avenue (also known as Eagle Point Road) and 690th Avenue, and all of the property owners have requested annexation, said David Schofield, director of public works, at the Menomonie City Council’s August 4 meeting.
The landowners are Nicholas Rassbach; Ronnie E. Prochnow; Rusk Prairie Farms, LLC; Red Cedar Produce, LLC; Janet L. Koepl; Gregory M. Quilling; Anthony J. Swanson; and Adrie E. Swanson.
Prior to discussing and voting on the annexation and temporary zoning to agriculture and the rezone to Restricted Industrial (R-1), the city council held a public hearing.
More than two dozen people spoke during the public hearing that lasted for more than two hours, and while many of them were opposed to developing a data center, others were in favor of the rezone and were in support of economic development.
Those who were opposed to the rezone and a data center expressed concerns about the environment and the use of electricity and water as well as the loss of prime farmland and asked for environmental assessment reports.
Data centers are known for using large amounts of electricity and water, although Schofield reported that this particular data center would use less water than the irrigation system currently installed in the farm fields.
Those who were opposed also were concerned about a small number of jobs that would reportedly be created and the amount of property tax a data center would pay to the city.
Those in favor of the rezone said that no matter what was developed on the annexed land, it would bring economic development and opportunities to the area.
The issues before the Menomonie City Council August 4 were the annexation and temporary rezone to agriculture and the rezone to Restricted Commercial.
The city council did not consider approval of a data center.
Comp plan
The proposed annexation and rezone was on the agenda for the Menomonie Plan Commission on July 28, Schofield noted.
The plan commission recommended the annexation and the rezone to Restricted Industrial.
The annexation would be contiguous with the City of Menomonie’s existing boundary for three-quarters of a mile along Highway B between Eagle Point Road and 708th Avenue and would be contiguous to the city’s industrial park, Schofield said.
The annexation also would be consistent with the city’s comprehensive land use plan, which shows future industrial development to the east and to the north of the north industrial park, he said.
Water service
As for serving the annexed area with sewer and water services, there is a 20-inch water main at the intersection of 59th Street and 708th Avenue and a 16-inch water main at the intersection of Eagle Point Road and Highway B, which is directly adjacent to the southwest corner of the area that would be annexed, Schofield said.
The city’s water utility has the capacity to provide the proposed 75,000 gallons per day that would be used by a data center, he said.
The data center, if it were developed, would use a closed-loop system and would be the fifth largest water user in Menomonie, Schofield said.
Cardinal FG, 3M, ConAgra and UW-Stout are the four largest water users.
For comparison, part of the land that would be annexed is irrigated, and the irrigation used 30 million gallons of water from July 1 to September 30 in 2024. That amounts to 330,000 gallons per day, Schofield said.
The amount of water used for irrigation comes from reports to the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources.
An industrial application that uses 75,000 gallons of water per day, 365 days per year, would use 27.375 million gallons annually, or about three million gallons less than the irrigation that is currently used in the same farm fields.
During the public hearing, one area resident said he was concerned his well would run dry because of the data center’s water usage.
Sewer service
There is a 10-inch sanitary sewer main at the intersection of Eagle Point Road and Highway B which is directly adjacent to the southwest corner of the area that would be annexed, Schofield said.
The City of Menomonie is working with the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources and the West Central Wisconsin Regional Planning Commission to update the Urban Sewer Service Area Plan, he said.
The plan is expected to be completed by January of 2026. The sewer utility has the capacity to accept 75,000 gallons per day of average wastewater flow, Schofield said.
Rezone
Rezoning the land to Restricted Industrial does not lock in a data center, Schofield said.
Before a data center could be developed, the city would have to negotiate a development agreement with the developer, and the Public Service Commission of Wisconsin would have to approve Xcel Energy’s plan to supply electricity, he said.
A data center is allowed in Restricted Industrial (R-1) but also would be allowed in I-2 and I-3 zones, Schofield said, noting that I-2 and I-3 zones are less restrictive than I-1 zoning.
The city is not under an obligation to follow the Town of Red Cedar’s comprehensive land use plan, he said.
Menomonie does not run its own electrical utility, so the city would not regulate the plan to supply electricity. Regulating electricity would be up to the PSC, Schofield said.
Data center
The data center would have two data halls, an office building and a warehouse and would have an assessed value between $29 million and $90 million, Schofield said.
For comparison, WalMart Distribution has an assessed valued of $36 million, and Andersen Windows has an assessed value of $28 million, he said.
If the land that would be annexed were put into a Tax Increment Finance District, it would “capture money for development,” Schofield said.
The facility, which would be developed in two phases, would generate between $1.1 million and $3.6 million in property taxes per year, he said.
An environmental assessment is not required for an annexation or a rezone, Schofield noted.
Cardinal FG and WalMart Distribution were not subject to an environmental assessment at this point in the development, he said.
The project would disturb more than one acre and would require an endangered resource review and storm-water management, for example, but there is not anything to review at this point because a design for the data center has not yet been completed, Schofield said.
Not contingent
One city council member pointed out that the city council’s vote on annexation and rezone is not contingent on the development of a data center.
If the property is annexed and rezoned, the City of Menomonie does not own the land, and the landowners can sell it to anyone they want to sell it to, said Jeff Luther, city council member representing Ward 1.
The city cannot stop a company from purchasing the property, Schofield said.
“That is correct,” said Ben Ludeman, an attorney with Weld Riley who represents the City of Menomonie.
The city does not own the land, and the city does not have control of the land and who the land is sold to, Ludeman said.
Under Restricted Industrial, a variety of activities would be allowed, including an airport; a contractor’s storage yard; enameling and painting shops; food locker plants; laboratories; machine shops; the manufacture of many different items; processing, packing and manufacture of confections, cosmetics, food and pharmaceuticals, except meat and meat products, fish and fish products, sauerkraut and cabbage byproducts and the vining of peas; and storage or warehousing.
The data center would be considered storage or warehousing.
Good jobs
Sydney Brennan, city council member representing Ward 9, noted that she is a recent graduate of UW-Stout and that UW-Stout graduates struggle to find good jobs in this area.
Stout graduates would like to stay here in Menomonie, but there are no good jobs, she said.
“Economic development is super important for the area,” Brennan said.
It seems as if “we want to push the students out” of the area. If people cannot afford to live here, then they cannot stay here, she said.
The population of Menomonie is not increasing because the jobs are not here, and the area needs economic development, Brennan said.
Foxconn
Ryland Erdman, city council member representing Ward 10, said he did not want another “Foxconn fiasco.”
If the annexation and rezone to I-1 passes and Balloonist LLC says “nope” then what happens? Erdman asked.
The company proposing a data center has been identified as Balloonist LLC.
Foxconn required upfront investment from the city to spend money on improvements and infrastructure, Schofield said.
A developer’s agreement would come to the city council for consideration, he said.
Foxconn was a development in Mount Pleasant, about 30 miles south of Milwaukee, that was supposed to create 13,000 jobs.
Mount Pleasant has a population of about 28,000 and spent $100 million on infrastructure and land acquisition to attract the Foxconn development. Foxconn’s plans changed, and the company scaled back operations, leaving the village with infrastructure costs and a reduced economic impact.
Racine County and the state of Wisconsin also spent money on the Foxconn development.
Approximately 100 houses were demolished to make room for the Foxconn development.
Eric Atkinson, city administrator, noted that if the landowners in the Town of Red Cedar chose to sell their land, it was not true that the city would not have any control.
If the city annexes and rezones the land, then the city would control the development on the land, Atkinson said.
The city would play a role in the development agreement and in paying any incentives, and would control whether there is a TIF district and would control the utilities, Ludeman said.
Delay
Several city council members said they wanted to delay the vote on the annexation and rezone for 90 days to allow the public to petition for a referendum.
One of the points made during the public hearing was that residents of the city wanted to vote on the annexation and rezone in a referendum.
The annexation would have to be approved or denied within 20 days after the public hearing, and the rezone must be approved or denied within 120 days according to state law, Ludeman said.
In 2023, Wisconsin law changed regarding advisory referendums. Annexation cannot be part of an advisory referendum, he said.
A motion to deny the request for annexation and the request for a rezone died for the lack of a second.
September 8
A motion was made to postpone the vote until the city council’s September 8 meeting.
Why not the next meeting? Why wait? Brennan asked.
There has been a “firehose of information” and trust has been damaged. Delaying to September 8 would give people extra time to process the information, said Cody Gentz, city council member representing Ward 7.
Erdman suggested that representatives for Balloonist LLC “talk to the neighbors.”
People can do Google searches, but it would be better if the information came directly from the source, Erdman said.
The city council unanimously approved a motion to waive the rules to allow a representative for the Balloonist to speak.
Douglas Buck of Quarles and Brady spoke on behalf of the Balloonist.
The annexation and rezone is “not a last approval,” he said.
Delaying the annexation and rezone will not introduce extra information pertaining to the site, Buck said.
A data center would need municipal services, and the city council has control of municipal services, he said.
The city has been planning for industrial use on this site, and the proposal is ready to move forward, Buck said.
Developing the site will be a long and competitive process and delay will not help the process. The public process and the debate
