The city of Umatilla, Oregon, has declared a state of emergency over Governor Tina Kotek's order pausing state environmental permits for new and expanded data centers, an escalation of local pushback against the statewide freeze. Five of the six city council members present voted for the declaration at a Tuesday night meeting, the Oregon Capital Chronicle reported. The declaration formally asks Kotek to withdraw or modify her directive, which stop
Editorial photo by Saskia Hatvany showing a data center facility operating in Umatilla, Oregon.ped air and water pollution permits for data centers through July 2027.
The declaration
Under the resolution, the city requests a comprehensive economic impact assessment of the order and authorizes City Manager Dave Stockdale to coordinate with other local governments on legal action against the state. Mayor Caden Sipe was the lone council member to question staff during the meeting, the Chronicle reported.
Stockdale, who drafted the resolution, questioned whether a categorical suspension exceeds the state environmental agency's statutory authority or infringes on municipal home rule powers.
What the city says is at stake
City staff put the potential damage at more than $5 billion in anticipated private investment in the Umatilla area, with projects delayed more than two years, at least 1,000 construction jobs at risk, and about $6 million in direct financial losses, Data Center Dynamics reported. Up to $12 million in water infrastructure contributions and payments toward a bond funding a new police station are also in doubt, according to OPB. "(The) City should not be required to wait until investments are abandoned, jobs are lost, or essential services are compromised before taking action," Stockdale wrote in a report to the council.
Umatilla, a city of about 8,000 residents 180 miles up the Columbia River from Portland, has four data centers operating, one under construction, and two more planned. The city and Umatilla County attracted Amazon AWS with tax breaks worth nearly $100 million last year, OregonLive reported.
The projects frozen mid-permit
When Kotek's directive landed, operators had several major projects in the state's permitting pipeline. They include Amazon's planned exascale campus on 1,300 acres in Boardman and a Sabey Data Centers building on a 60-acre lot in Umatilla, tracked by Baxtel as the Boardman Exascale Campus and SDC Umatilla. "This directive was issued abruptly, without meaningful stakeholder engagement of the workers, businesses, and municipalities it will affect," an Amazon spokesperson said.
A state split along regional lines
Elsewhere, the response to the pause divided east and west. Hermiston City Manager Mark Morgan told OPB the order cost his city about $550 million in future fee revenue and that Amazon has canceled multiple planned data center developments there. Prineville Mayor Steve Uffelman said data center fees far exceed what his city would collect in property taxes. Hillsboro councilors, in the Portland suburbs, voted the same night to approve permanent rules capping data center development at just over 600 acres. An OPB-commissioned poll found nearly two-thirds of likely Oregon voters back a temporary ban.
Baxtel market context
Baxtel tracks 168 data center facilities in Oregon totaling 4,043 MW across 39 providers. Amazon AWS is the largest operator with 64 sites, and the AWS US West (Oregon) cloud region holds 69 facilities at 2,555 MW, eight of them under construction.
Why it matters
The emergency declaration is less about disaster law than leverage. Umatilla is using the only tool it has to force a response from Salem, and its legal theory, that a blanket permit suspension exceeds the state environmental agency's authority, is now on the record for other data center cities to reuse. Both major gubernatorial candidates support the moratorium, so the city's path runs through court, not the ballot box.
The next test is whether other cities sign on. Stockdale now holds council authorization to coordinate legal action, and the legislature that will write Oregon's data center rules does not convene until late January.
