In 1999, the Bland family farm donated nearly 88 acres of land to the City of Taylor, Texas, for the grand sum of $10. The deed was clear: the land was to be held in trust as parkland for Williamson County. A farmer named Bland wanted local kids to have somewhere to play.
Fast forward 26 years, and a data center is being built on that land instead.
How It Happened
The ownership chain reads like a shell game. The Texas Parks and Recreation Foundation first transferred the land to the Williamson County Park Foundation in 2003, then handed it to the City of Taylor a month later. So far, so good — it was still a public entity holding it. But in 2008, the city sold the property for $15,000 to the Taylor Economic Development Corporation (TEDC). The land sat empty until 2025, when TEDC sold it to Blueprint — the company now building the data center — for $10 million.
That’s a tidy return on a $15,000 investment, and a far cry from a public park.
Residents Fight Back
When locals first caught wind of the 135,000-square-foot data center project, their concerns were the usual ones: noise, light pollution, air quality, and the massive water and power demands these facilities bring to small towns. Taylor has a population of just 16,267.
But then Pamela Griffin, a Taylor resident who grew up playing near the Bland property, remembered something. She recalled a conversation between her father and Mr. Bland: “I’m thinking about giving this land for parkland because these kids need somewhere to play.” That memory became the community’s legal leverage.
Griffin and other activists dug through public records and confirmed the park stipulation in the original deed. She and her family hired an attorney to fight the construction and return the land to the community.
The City’s Position
Taylor officials aren’t budging. The city’s executive director of community services, Daniel Seguin, told 404 Media that Blueprint doesn’t need city approval because the property’s existing Employment Center zoning already permits data center construction. The city’s FAQ page is blunt: “Can the City just say no to data centers? In short, no.”
The city argues the project will bring $30 million in tax revenue over the next decade. But Griffin isn’t buying it. “If they start messing with deeds in Texas,” she said, “allowing deeds to be not upheld — what’s going to happen to all of us?”
Legal Setbacks
The fight isn’t going well in court. Blueprint filed a motion to dismiss the initial lawsuit, which the judge granted. When Griffin’s lawyer requested an injunction to halt construction while the case moves through the Third Court of Appeals in Austin, the judge denied that too. Construction continues.
The Bigger Picture
This isn’t just a local zoning dispute. It’s a case study in how the AI infrastructure boom is reshaping communities — often without their consent. Data centers are proliferating across the US at a staggering rate, driven by the insatiable compute demands of large language models and cloud services. Small towns are being courted with promises of tax revenue, and deals are being cut with minimal public input.
The Bland family’s original vision — a gift of land for children to play on — has been chewed up by the machinery of economic development. A deed that was supposed to protect the public interest was quietly transferred, rezoned, and sold for profit. If a conditional land deed in Texas isn’t enforceable, it raises uncomfortable questions about what other community protections are at risk as the data center gold rush accelerates.
What’s Next
Griffin’s case is now headed to the Third Court of Appeals in Austin. Even if the legal battle ultimately fails, the story has drawn national attention to how local governments handle land donated for public use. For the residents of Taylor, the fight isn’t just about one data center — it’s about whether a community’s word still means anything when there’s $10 million on the table.
