Iowans
in Control

The water doesn't come back

Meta's data center in Altoona draws from the Jordan Aquifer, a deep, ancient groundwater source, and its agreement with the city lets it use up to 16% of Altoona's water. Iowa's state geologist, Keith Schilling, warns that water pumped from deep aquifers like these isn't coming back: "All water lost to this deep aquifer is lost forever in human terms."

Google told Linn County its proposed data center could use as much as 12 million gallons of water a day, drawn from the Cedar River. When the county asked for a water study, Google had committed up to $500,000 to fund one – then walked away from that commitment by moving to annex its land into a neighboring town.

Fifty jobs, $208 million

Apple got about $208 million in tax breaks to build its Waukee data center back in 2017 – a facility that created just 50 permanent jobs. That works out to roughly $4.16 million in public subsidy for every job.

Iowa hands data centers at least $150 million a year in tax breaks. In Cedar Rapids alone, the city's agreement with QTS could rebate an estimated $529 million in property taxes over 20 years – for a campus its own documents say may bring as few as 15 to 30 long-term jobs.

The deal's done before you hear a word

In February 2026, Linn County unanimously passed one of the most comprehensive data center ordinances in the country – mandatory water studies, 1,000-foot setbacks, and binding water-use agreements. Days later, Google moved to annex its land into the tiny city of Palo (pop. ~1,407) to get out from under those rules. A later investigation found Palo's leaders had negotiated with Google for months while downplaying it in public.

Supervisor Sami Scheetz described what happened as a "multi-trillion dollar corporation pitting local governments against each other in a race to the bottom." At a public hearing, Palo resident Dorothy Landt asked: "Why has Linn County, Iowa, become a dumping ground for soon-to-be obsolete technology that spoils our landscape and robs us of our resources?"

The fight is still live. On July 1, 2026, Linn County paused all new large data center rezonings for 18 months. Weeks later, Palo passed its own, looser rules – the kind Google's annexation move was designed to reach. Even now, the county is weighing an exception that could let the project through anyway, tied to a nearby nuclear plant restart. No deal is final.

Where we stand

Data centers can bring construction jobs and real investment. But a project can help a county's budget and still get decided without the people who live there. Iowans deserve a real say before the deal is signed, and we all deserve a say over the powerful AI these data centers are built to run. Whether any one project gets built is a local call – we don't make it for anyone.

Why do they need data centers?

These data centers are critical in the race toward powerful AI that the companies admit they can't fully control. Either we set the rules for AI now, or the companies keep playing by their own – and AI's only getting more powerful.

Now Deere is taking the driver out of the cab

Iowa farmers are already under pressure. Farm income here is projected to fall about a quarter this year – driven by low crop prices and high costs, not AI. And now John Deere is building the squeeze into the equipment itself. At CES the company revealed fully autonomous tractors – no one in the cab, the whole job run from a phone. Deere calls it an answer to a farm labor shortage. But a tractor built to run itself is a tractor built to need fewer people – and no one has told Iowa's farm workers what that means for them.

Who owns what your equipment knows

Modern tractors collect everything – planting dates, yield maps, fertilizer rates, field boundaries, even fuel use. John Deere says farmers "control" that data. But the fine print lets Deere pool it, share it with its affiliates, and hand dealers access by default. A law firm is now investigating whether Deere used and shared farmers' data beyond what it disclosed. Who really controls the data your farm produces?

What Iowa's farmers see coming

Iowa farmers see where this leads. In Iowa State's 2022 Farm Poll, more than 7 in 10 said precision farming will likely mean fewer, larger farms. More than half worry their own data could be used for regulatory purposes. And 4 in 10 think corporations will use that data for their own benefit, not the farmer's.

The tractor was the warm-up

Every one of these fights comes down to one question: who controls the technology that runs your farm? Right to repair. Your data. The machines themselves. And that question is only getting bigger. AI companies say they're building AI that can do almost any human job – and they admit they aren't sure they can control what they build. Iowa farmers already know how this goes when a company owns the technology and you don't. Either we set the rules for AI now, or the companies keep writing their own – and AI's only getting more powerful.

The big picture

According to a lawsuit against OpenAI, its own safety system flagged more than 300 of one teen's messages about self-harm, and the chatbot kept talking. And these companies aren't building better chatbots – their own mission statements say the goal is AI that does everything a human can do. A chatbot was the easy test. They failed it. Either we set the rules for AI now, or the companies keep playing by their own – and AI's only getting more powerful.