WHTM’s Dennis Owens opened his report with a number that stops people mid-sentence: a Cumberland County farmer in Silver Spring Township turned down a deal worth millions – money that would have transformed his land into a data center.
The farmer, Mervin Raudabaugh, has lived on that farmland for decades, and Owens made it clear this wasn’t just a business asset to him. It’s the kind of place where time piles up in layers – work, family, memory, and routine – until the property feels less like “real estate” and more like a living scrapbook.
Owens explained that instead of taking the data center money, Raudabaugh chose something that looks almost backwards in modern America: he sold the development rights to the land for about $2 million, effectively putting a lock on what the property can become…