A crowd larger and more passionate than many can remember seeing at a Sioux Falls City Council meeting Tuesday tried to fight the city’s first hyperscale data center but didn’t prevail.
During a nearly six-hour meeting with a crowd that overflowed the council chambers, council members heard from more than five dozen people giving public input — most of it opposed to the proposed project about 1 mile south of the Veterans Parkway exit for Interstate 90, near the intersection with Rice Street.
The property is owned by Gemini Data Center SD LLC, which is connected to a California-based family office led by Michael Anvar that has a history of investing in real estate. The group acquired 164 acres from Xcel Energy in late 2023 just south of Xcel’s Split Rock substation and Angus Anson power station. The vote on Tuesday was to rezone the property to light industrial and approve a preliminary subdivision plan…