What happens when small-town America becomes data-centre, USA

What happens when small-town America becomes data-centre, USA

In northeast Oregon, a growing fleet of Amazon data centres has turned Umatilla and nearby towns into an unlikely nerve centre of America’s tech expansion. Windowless buildings the size of multiple football fields now anchor a local economy once defined by farm work, a state prison and the remnants of a chemical-weapons depot. For some residents, prosperity is suddenly tangible: home prices have roughly doubled, new subdivisions climb the hillsides, and realtors say business is the best it’s ever been, the Wall Street Journal reported.

Why the money is flowing here

Corporate America’s rush for cloud storage and AI computing has made data centres one of the few construction categories still growing. The five biggest tech giants account for more than a third of S&P 500 capital spending. Developers go where three inputs line up: land, power and water. Along the Columbia, hydroelectric dams, fibre routes linking West Coast hubs and ample sites have pulled in thousands of construction workers and a pipeline of projects stretching years.

A concentrated bet with national ripples

The investment is vast but uneven. Recent estimates put annual US data-centre spending at about $41 billion, while roughly 72% of capacity sits in just 1% of counties. The clustering brings speed benefits—faster connections for AI applications and streaming—but it also concentrates economic fortune. Last week’s $7 billion Oracle–OpenAI campus in Michigan underscores the scale now landing in places far from Silicon Valley.

Jobs today, questions tomorrow

During construction, the money is unmistakable: full hotels and RV parks, rush orders for concrete and fencing, and steady shifts for electricians, technicians and suppliers. One estimate suggests each four-building campus supports as many as 140 full-time roles; across Umatilla County, Amazon counts the equivalent of about 3,200 employees and contractors. Once campuses go live, however, parking lots empty and headcounts flatten, prompting a recurring question in town: what happens when they stop building?

Every day life gets more expensive

The upside has carried costs. Housing and child-care bills are rising beyond the reach of many blue-collar families. Some long-time residents feel the pace has outstripped the local labour market, forcing companies to import skilled workers. Restaurants and shops have adapted—stocking new beers for transplanted crews, hosting weekly gatherings that can cover a month’s rent—but the feel of small-town familiarity is thinning as newcomers stream in.

Budgets swell—and strain

City ledgers tell the story. Umatilla’s annual budget has surged from about $7 million in 2011 to $144 million in the past fiscal year, and staff has more than doubled. Instead of standard property taxes, developers typically make multi-year payments in lieu of taxes worth millions per campus. That cash, controlled by city and county officials, has fuelled roads, water systems and grants—but also sharpened fights over whether to fund new projects or shore up existing services.

Schools and skills in a new economy

The district is seeing modest enrolment growth after years of stagnation, and a gleaming facility now trains students in robotics and metal fabrication—helped by data-centre-linked revenues that kept a recent bond’s tax bite lower than past proposals. Amazon has funded high-school and college programs to build a local talent pipeline for technicians and operators. The challenge is ongoing: capital pays for buildings; staffing and long-term operations still need steady money.

Water, power and the landscape

Alongside land, the most prized resources are electricity and cooling water. In Hermiston, an Amazon-financed project will divert river water to cool server halls, supply drinking water and aid irrigation. Officials are annexing more land and readying parts of the old depot for future campuses. Developers beyond Amazon—such as Sabey Data Centers—are sketching plans, while others have held talks as towns bet that AI demand keeps surging.

Politics in the boomtown era

Rapid growth has frayed civic ties. In Umatilla, a public dispute over spending new revenue escalated into a lawsuit pitting the mayor against city leaders, who deny his claims and are seeking dismissal. Across agencies, the scramble to tap the city’s coffers has replaced the mutual aid of leaner years. As one official put it, this feels like a fleeting opportunity, and everyone wants to secure their share before the cycle turns.

The wager on what comes next

For now, the cranes keep moving. Amazon says it is on track to double AWS capacity by 2027, and local managers—some raised in the area—see careers that once seemed impossible without leaving home. Yet the concentration of spending, the relatively small number of permanent jobs per campus, and the volatility of corporate capex have residents asking a simple question beneath the celebratory headlines: how do you build a town that can prosper after the building stops?

Bottom line

The data-centre boom has given Umatilla and its neighbours a rare chance to trade stagnation for growth. It has lifted paycheques, school programs and city budgets—and pushed up rents, workloads and political tensions. If AI is still in its infancy, the bets may pay off for years. If not, the test will be whether these towns used their windfall to build something resilient enough to last.