Our Week in Grant County

09/03/2026

The first recorded mention of a datacenter from a Marion Common Councilmember is to announce it is dead.

The first time a Marion council member has addressed the data center from the dais. In seventy-five recorded council meetings since January 2024, the words had come up twice before: a member's aside about billion-dollar data centers during a software contract in August 2025, and the president cuttin

09/01/2026

Three answers so far on data center NDAs. All three are no.

Marion Mayor Ronald Morrell Jr., Gas City Mayor Bill Rock Jr., and County Commissioner Chuck Poling have each said they have not signed a non-disclosure agreement about data center development in Grant County.

175 of 178 elected offices still read "no response."

Elected officials can answer in one click at www.ourweek.in/nda and the full list is at www.ourweek.in/grant-county/reports/nda-question

We are putting one question to every state and local official on the Grant County ballot, and to the three members of Congress who represent this county. Answers are published here as they arrive.

08/30/2026

UPDATE: Data centers in Grant County — what changed this week

In one week, this story moved three times.

Sunday, Aug. 23 — Mayor Ronald Morrell Jr. published the one-page “Project Riverjump” summary himself — more than $2 billion, a roughly 800-acre campus in Marion — and said the deal had become real.

Wednesday, Aug. 26 — the mayor said he will not endorse the proposal, describing it for the first time as “a hyperscale data center in West Marion.”

Thursday, Aug. 27 — in interviews with the Chronicle-Tribune, he named the company: updates “should come directly from Meta or its representatives.” He said no deal has been presented to the city council, that the Oct. 6 meeting is not moving forward, and that there will be no data center development in Marion under his administration. His interviews are the only place Meta has been named — no government document carries it, and the company has said nothing.

https://www.chronicle-tribune.com/news/mayor-walks-away-from-proposed-data-center-project/article_a3f15237-10b5-5a1c-a5b4-84234624e357.html

Also this week: a petition on Change.org asking that no data center be built in Grant County — addressed to the mayor and council members David Cain, Jim Brunner and Brian Cowgill — opened Monday, Aug. 24 and reached 1,084 signatures by Saturday. On Aug. 26 it drew the first response we have found from any Marion council member on the record about the project. “My understanding is that the Data Center is not moving forward,” wrote David Cain of District 6.

https://www.change.org/p/prevent-construction-of-any-data-centers-in-grant-county-indiana

What none of this settles: no application is on file, no site has been named, and a non-endorsement is not a withdrawal — the land agreements the mayor described on Aug. 23 are private contracts his position does not undo.

The residents’ town hall is still on: Monday, Sept. 14, 6 p.m., REAL Community Covenant Church, 1240 S. Adams St.

The full record — every document, recording and land record in this story, each one you can open and check for yourself:

https://ourweek.in/grant-county/reports/data-centers

How we got here — the county's own documents, recordings and land records, from a closed factory in 2022 to a $2 billion sheet circulating in Marion this summer.

08/28/2026

It took a year for Grant County's data center story to go from rumor to record. Now you can hear it — 42 minutes, told in the county's own voices, from the recordings the county itself publishes.

▶️ ourweek.in/grant-county/reports/data-centers/listen

One question runs through the whole story: have you signed a non-disclosure or confidentiality agreement concerning data center development? OurWeek's NDA canvass puts that question to every elected official on the Grant County ballot — 178 offices. Mayor Morrell has answered in his statement. Commissioner Poling has answered in a recorded meeting. The other 176 lines are still blank.

Any official can answer in about a minute at ourweek.in/nda — yes, no, or prefer not to say. We publish the answer either way, and nothing appears without a person confirming it first.

The full list of who has answered — and who hasn't — is on the canvass page.

The Grant County data center story, told in the county's own voices — 42 minutes.

08/24/2026

Mayor Ronald Morrell Jr. released a one-page summary yesterday describing a $2 billion project on about 800 acres in Marion.

It never uses the words "data center." It never names a company. It never says where.

Here is a deep dive into what the public record actually says — including a study the county paid for, recommending it "soft-pedal" the data center idea in all public documents and secure land options before any public announcement.

Mayor Morrell states that he has not signed an NDA regarding data center development. We invite the rest of Grant County's elected officials to say whether they have signed one, at ourweek.in/nda

How we got here — the county's own documents, recordings and land records, from a closed factory in 2022 to a $2 billion sheet circulating in Marion this summer.

08/12/2026

Part 1 of a 3-part deep dive on Flock cameras in Grant County.

Thirty-nine license plate cameras are mapped inside the county line, each listed below with a link to look at its location. How the towns bought them, and what public records do and do not say, is the

07/31/2026

Go straight to the source and find out what is fact and what is fiction.

Fifteen hours of Area Plan Commission video across seven meetings, broken into the moments that matter.

07/20/2026

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