A Cumberland County farmer in Pennsylvania has become an unlikely symbol of resistance to the artificial intelligence boom by refusing a $15 million offer for an industrial-scale data center on his land. Instead of cashing out, he chose to keep his farm intact and in production, even as developers promised a lucrative future built on servers and fiber. His decision captures a widening clash between rural landowners and the technology companies racing to build the infrastructure that powers AI.
The standoff is not only about one property line or one payout. It reflects a deeper argument over what kind of growth communities are willing to accept in their own backyards, and who gets to decide when the needs of a digital economy outweigh the value of open fields, clean water, and quiet roads. Across the country, residents are weighing short-term windfalls against long-term changes to their landscape and way of life.
The Pennsylvania farmer who said no
In Cumberland County, a longtime farmer named Jan was approached with a proposal that would have transformed his operation into a sprawling AI data facility. The offer, valued at $15 million, would have turned his land from rows of crops into rows of servers, yet he declined, choosing to keep the property in agriculture rather than sell to the developer who wanted to build in his backyard. Local accounts describe how the Cumberland County landowner weighed the money against the loss of open space and decided the price was too high.
Jan did not act alone or on impulse. Once he understood the scale of the proposal, he called Jeb and Lancaster Farmland Trust and said, “Hey, are you guys interested in preserving?” inviting conservation partners to help protect the acreage from industrial conversion. In a video account, he describes how, once Laura became involved, the conversation shifted from a private sale to a broader effort to keep the land in permanent agricultural use, with Jeb and Lancaster, other advocates working on preservation options…