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CPD’s Pyle placed on paid administrative leave pending investigation
FRIDAY, APRIL 10, 2026 | Brandi Owczarz, Gordon Gazette
On Friday morning, April 10, 2026, the Calhoun City Council met in a Special Called Meeting, immediately going into executive session, where they stayed for about two hours before adjourning. At that time, it was announced that no immediate decision was being taken.
Mayor Jimmy Palmer was not in attendance at the meeting, but Council members Ed Moyer, Al Edwards, Jackie Palazzolo and Bruce Potts, as well as Administrator Paul Worley and Attorney Brandon Bowen were all in attendance. Also present was Calhoun Police Chief Tony Pyle, who the Gazette began receiving allegations of misconduct and wrong-doing within the Calhoun Police Department months ago.
The Gazette has received complaints of morale issues and frustration among officers at the CPD due to alleged harassment of employees by leadership to the point where careers were jeopardized, alleged sexual misconduct and alleged sexual harassment, allegations of non-sworn officers appearing to look and act in a sworn capacity such as wearing a badge and carrying a firearm, along with accusations of general mismanagement and lack of leadership within the department. The Gazette has been told that the department basically works on a "skeleton crew" due to the large number of officers fleeing for other areas due to the "toxic environment" at the department. One former officer went so far as to allege that any serious incident within the City of Calhoun could be catastrophic if it involved police response due to the lack of personnel at any given time.
On Friday afternoon, Calhoun Administrator Paul Worley released a statement saying that Pyle had been placed on paid administrative leave.
“As of this afternoon, Calhoun Police Chief Tony Pyle has been placed on paid administrative leave pending the outcome of an independent investigation. Lt. Colonel Ken Carson will be serving as Interim Chief during the investigation,” said Worley.
While the City is being tight-lipped about what the investigation concerns, the Gazette released a story last Thursday, April 2, which examined a questionable incident in September 2021 involving a suspicious vehicle 911 call in Floyd County involving Pyle and a female passenger. After the responding officer arrived on scene, it appears the incident was possibly a sexual encounter, with the Floyd County PD officer who responded telling Pyle and the woman that “Y’all know a bedroom is better than this, right?” and asking them to put their clothes on.
Pyle gave the Gazette a statement about the incident, saying, “At the time of the incident, I was in Rome for a business trip and was returning back to Calhoun. While traveling, I received a call from an informant who stated that she needed immediate assistance. She claimed to have information regarding a major drug dealer and that her life was in danger. After reassuring my passenger that this young lady who called me posed no threat and I believed she was in danger if I did not act. [W]e agreed picking the informant up in Shannon was the right thing to do. She (informant) was extremely distressed and hysterical due to a resent [sic] altercation with said drug dealer.”
It should be noted that the Floyd County officer who responded to the suspicious vehicle report and investiated the incident asked for the identification of both Pyle and the female passenger, and processed the tag of the van, which Pyle identified on scene as an undercover vehicle, through dispatch. At no time was a third person mentioned by Pyle or his female passenger, nor was a third person identified by the officer from Floyd County investigating the incident, and Floyd County 911 records only show the identification ran through dispatch for two individuals.
Calhoun Administrator Paul Worley told the Gazette last week that “This incident was reported to the City for investigation, and it was thoroughly investigated. The allegations are serious and would be a violation of City of Calhoun policy. At the same time, the allegations were vehemently denied and have not been substantiated. The body camera footage you reference does not itself show the violation, and the Floyd County officer did not issue a citation or a report that would support the allegation. Ultimately, the City has issued a reprimand that is appropriate to the severity of the allegations, but also considers the age of the alleged conduct (more than four years ago), the fact that they are not substantiated, and the long service of the Chief.”
You can read the original story on this page BELOW.
On Saturday, April 4, 2026, the Gordon Gazette received a voicemail from Marlene Pyle, the wife of Tony Pyle. In the voicemail, she stated, “I’m not having a great day, Brandi, thanks to you. If you don’t call me, I’m going to post on there (the social media post concerning the investigation) that I tried to contact you and you wouldn’t speak to me.”
Gazette owner Brandi Owczarz called Marlene Pyle back, where she told Owczarz that “you didn’t have the facts and posted a video not knowing what the hell you were doing.” She also asked Owczarz, “Did you have any idea a confidential informant (was in the van) that you could have gotten killed?”
Due to the talk by both Pyles of a confidential informant in the van at the time of the incident, on Monday, April 6, 2026, the Gazette sent the Calhoun City Council, Administrator Worley, Mayor Palmer and Chief Pyle the below follow-up questions concerning the 2021 suspicious vehicle incident. The questions we asked were:
1. Did Chief Pyle alert Floyd County PD that he was inside their jurisdiction performing a law enforcement action on Sept. 22, 2021?
2. What follow-up coordination did Chief Pyle perform with Floyd County PD after the alleged “emergency” with the “confidential informant” subsided, since it happened inside Floyd County’s jurisdiction?
3. Was the Rome DEA Office informed that Chief Pyle was working a case/informant in Floyd County? If so, please send over supporting documents.
4. Was Chief Pyle deputized on Sept. 22, 2021 at the time of the event through a local sheriff’s office or as a federal task force officer, in order to be legally operating outside of his jurisdiction in an official capacity. Please send documentation if so.
5. Was any corresponding information gained, by meeting the informant, passed on to the Calhoun Police Department’s Safe Streets Task Force detectives or action? If so, please send documentation.
6. Is there a Department of Justice press release, FBI press release or DEA press release addressing the arrest Chief Pyle mentions in his statement to the Gazette? If so, is the Calhoun Police Department mentioned in the press release as a participating and/or supporting agency?
7. According to the phone call the Gazette received on Saturday from Chief Pyle’s wife, the “confidential informant” that Chief Pyle met during the incident on Sept. 22, 2021 was hiding in the van, meaning the person seen in the front passenger seat in the body cam footage was just the female passenger, who has been identified off-record as a former City of Calhoun employee. Was that employee in the front passenger seat a sworn law enforcement officer privy to the sensitive case information that the informant would have been discussing with Chief Pyle? If not, what is the department procedure that permits non-law enforcement personnel to have access to that discussion?
The questions are very important concerning whether or not a confidential informant was actually in the vehicle; if Pyle was actually meeting with a confidential informant, despite how quick the meeting was or whether or not it was an emergency meeting, documents and reports would have been required to have been logged. Many within the law enforcement community question why Pyle, as a police chief, would be meeting with a confidential informant, especially outside of his jurisdiction, as it is not a job a police chief would typically handle but would instead be a job for investigative departments and/or a drug task force.
The limited response the Gazette received was from Chief Pyle himself, who said, “I am not required to alert anyone as far as just picking up an informant. No drug business took place in Floyd County. Look up O.C.G.A. 24-5-505 I will not be releasing any further info pertaining to said informant.” The City of Calhoun told the Gazette that Det. Don Colburn handled those types of information requests and was out of office last week.
The Gazette will continue to update on the Pyle situation as more information becomes available. Due to the severity of some of the alleged criminal activity that was reported to the Gazette to look into, the Gazette has passed every allegation they have received against the CPD, Pyle and many in leadership roles within the CPD, on to the GBI for a full investigation. For those allegations that were not criminal but possibly break internal rules, the Gazette continues to follow-up on those allegations.
Gazette begins to look into misconduct allegations at Calhoun Police Department
THURSDAY, APRIL 2, 2026 | Brandi Owczarz, Gordon Gazette
The Gordon Gazette has begun the task of looking into multiple claims of alleged misconduct and wrong-doing within the Calhoun Police Department.
For several months, the Gazette has received complaints of morale issues and frustration among officers at the CPD due to alleged harassment of employees by leadership to the point where careers were jeopardized, alleged sexual misconduct and alleged sexual harassment, non-sworn officers appearing to look and act in a sworn capacity, along with accusations of general mismanagement and lack of leadership within the department.
Due to the high volume of complaints, this is the first claim being examined that was used as an example of possible ethical misconduct within the department.
The Gazette learned that there was a questionable incident in September 2021 involving Calhoun Police Chief Tony Pyle and a woman stemming from a Floyd County 911 call. After the responding officer arrived on scene, it appears the incident was possibly a sexual encounter.
According to Floyd County 911 CAD records, which you can download HERE, at 4:45 p.m. on Wednesday, Sept. 22, 2021, a call was received concerning a suspicious vehicle around Calhoun Road NE /New Calhoun Highway in Adairsville-Floyd County just off of Hwy. 53 (Rome Road).
Body camera footage (that was redacted in some places), obtained by the Gazette from the Floyd County Police Department, shows an officer responding to the vehicle, a white minivan later identified as an undercover vehicle for the Calhoun Police Department.
The CPD uses undercover vehicles for drug and criminal surveillance purposes.
As seen in the video, the officer from the FCPD walks up to the van and says “Y’all know a bedroom is better than this, right?” The driver’s side window is slightly cracked at that time. The officer asks the driver, “Have you got your IDs on you? Go ahead and put your clothes on for me.”
The officer then walks to the back of the van, presumably to get the tag information.
At some point, the driver lowers his window more. The officer then walks back to the driver’s side and the driver, identified by viewing the video as Calhoun Police Chief Tony Pyle, says, “Man, who checks this (out here)?” The officer responds, “A police officer does.” The officer then asks Pyle if he has his ID on him; Pyle hands the officer ID, saying “One’s a driver’s license and one’s a motorcycle permit.”
While the windows on the van are dark, you can make out a woman in the passenger side front seat.
The officer then makes a call to dispatch to run the licenses and the VIN for the vehicle, and asks the woman in the passenger seat if she has ID on her.
Pyle then tells the officer that the vehicle’s tag will not come back, meaning that information on the tag will not be provided through running a search on the tag.
“Why does it not come back?” asks the FCPD officer.
“Because it’s an undercover car,” said Pyle. “It may come back, but I doubt it.”
The officer then seems to chastise Pyle.
“You should know better about doing it out here; you can get a room,” said the officer.
Pyle laughed and responded, “I didn’t think (unintelligible) when I pulled in.”
The officer hands Pyle the license back and said “Go on and get out of here. Y’all find somewhere else the next time.”
Pyle is then heard asking the officer, “You ain’t looking for a job, are you?” The officer responded that he was not.
“Rome takes all of my people,” Pyle said.
No incident report was provided to the Gazette, but it was requested, along with body cam, dash cam and 911 records. Dash cam was not provided. Two officers were originally called to the scene, but it appears one was called off according to the 911 records.
The Gazette has reached out to City of Calhoun Administrator Paul Worley, Calhoun Mayor Jimmy Palmer and Calhoun City Council members Ed Moyer, Al Edwards, Jackie Palazzolo and Bruce Potts to see if they are aware of this incident, and if so, if any disciplinary action was taken. According to Worley, the City is working on a response.
The Gazette additionally reached out to Georgia POST (Peace Officers and Standards Training Council) and the Georgia Association of Chiefs of Police as to if this incident was reported to their organizations and whether this incident possibly violated any ethics standards or rules in the State of Georgia. The Gazette asked specifically if the incident on video was ever reported to POST or the Georgia Association of Chiefs of Police and if so, if there was an outcome due to an investigation? The Gazette also asked if the actions in the video broke or violated any code or ethical standards of POST or the Georgia Association of Chiefs of Police.
The Gazette did receive a response from Georgia POST, which included the Individual Officer Profile for Pyle, which showed no investigations ever being perform and no sanctions levied against Pyle during his career.
"We have no previous POST investigation on (Pyle)," said Jill Dalon with POST.
Interestingly, in February of this year, Calhoun Police Department Lt. Col. Kenneth Carson was appointed by Governor Brian Kemp to serve on the Georgia Peace Officer Standards and Training Council (Georgia POST).
The Georgia Association of Chiefs of Police has not responded to the Gazette's email.
Chief Pyle sent a statement to the Gazette, via email attachment, saying in the email, "Paul (Worley) contacted me this morning regarding an incident from 2022 that you were inquiring about. I wanted to provide you with a copy of the information I spoke to Paul about months ago about this incident."
The statement reads:
"At the time of the incident, I was in Rome for a business trip and was returning back to Calhoun. While traveling, I received a call from an informant who stated that she needed immediate assistance. She claimed to have information regarding a major drug dealer and that her life was in danger. After reassuring my passenger that this young lady who called me posed no threat and I believed she was in danger if I did not act. we agreed picking the informant up in Shannon was the right thing to do. She (informant) was extremely distressed and hysterical due to a resent altercation with said drug dealer. While attempting to calm her I nearly collided with another vehicle. Realizing the danger, I pulled off the roadway onto a portion of a roadway that has been closed for years. I pulled in, turned around with my vehicle facing old Calhoun Road, and continued to calm the informant in preparation to get back on the road to Calhoun. At some point a marked police vehicle pulled into the area where we were parked. The officer exited the vehicle and immediately stated 'Get your clothes on' (Which I thought was an attempt at humor, however one of the three people in the vehicle was wearing a tan sports bra, which could have made him falsely believe someone was partially dress ) The vehicle I was driving was a white Dodge Van with heavily tinted windows that make it almost impossible to see into the vehicle, this includes the windshield. The officer went to the back of my vehicle to enter the tag. He came back almost immediately, as he approached I rolled down the driver’s window, at which point he could clearly see everyone in the vehicle was fully dressed. (it would not be possible for a grown man at six-foot-tall and two hundred pounds get dress in a few seconds while sitting behind the wheel) We spoke briefly and I gave him some subtle clues about the tag being a UC Vehicle. At that point I thought he was beginning to understand the situation because he said something to the effect of 'Just Move on' As he was leaving I even joked that we were hiring. The informant again became very upset about being possibly exposed, but I was able to calm her. We proceeded to drive back to Calhoun where I conducted the interview. I said all this to give you the back story and understand why I could not come forward earlier out of fear of the informant being exposed before the trial.
"PS: The information I received from said informant helped ensure an arrest of a large-scale dealer. (several pounds of drugs were seized as well)
"PPS: This is all the information I feel safe in releasing about this incident. Even though the case has concluded there will always be an element of danger for the informant."
UPDATE: The City of Calhoun's Administrator Paul Worley has sent the Gazette a statement on this incident.
"This incident was reported to the City for investigation, and it was thoroughly investigated. The allegations are serious and would be a violation of City of Calhoun policy. At the same time, the allegations were vehemently denied and have not been substantiated. The body camera footage you reference does not itself show the violation, and the Floyd County officer did not issue a citation or a report that would support the allegation. Ultimately, the City has issued a reprimand that is appropriate to the severity of the allegations, but also considers the age of the alleged conduct (more than four years ago), the fact that they are
not substantiated, and the long service of the Chief."
Hoods enter guilty pleas, sentenced
SATURDAY, FEBRUARY 14, 2026 | Brandi Owczarz, Gordon Gazette
On Friday, February 13, 2026, former Gordon County Commission chairperson Becky Hood and her husband, local businessman Scott Hood, both entered guilty pleas in Gordon County Superior Court concerning their years-long legal battle pertaining to child abuse charges.
The case was presided over by Senior Judge Ralph Van Pelt, Jr. of the Superior Courts of Georgia. No local judge from the Cherokee Judicial Circuit, which includes Gordon County, heard the cases against the Hoods due to conflict of interest.
In late March of 2025, Becky Hood was indicted on a count of 1st degree Cruelty to Children. According to that indictment, on or about Jan. 21, 2021, Becky Hood maliciously caused a minor child in the home, under the age of 18, cruel and excessive physical and mental pain by pouring coffee on the child, grabbing the child by the hair, pulling the child to the ground by her hair causing the child’s head to strike the ground, kicking the child, and calling the child a bitch.
At the time of Becky Hood's indictment, Scott Hood was indicted on a count of Child Molestation. According to the indictment, on or around Nov. 29, 2013, Scott Hood committed an immoral and indecent act on a minor child in the home, under the age of 16, with the intent to arouse and satisfy the sexual desires of the accused by touching the child’s vagina with his hand.
On Friday, Scott Hood entered a guilty plea on a charge of Sexual Battery on a Child Under the Age of 16 using the Alford plea.
Several noted law publications have described the Alford plea in detail. According to the University of Richmond Law Review, "When offering an Alford plea, a defendant asserts his innocence but admits that sufficient evidence exists to convict him of the offense." A Guide to Military Criminal Law states that under the Alford plea, "the defendant concedes that the prosecution has enough evidence to convict, but the defendant still refuses to admit guilt." The book Plea Bargaining's Triumph: A History of Plea Bargaining in America published by Stanford University Press defines the plea as one in "which the defendant adheres to his/her claim of innocence even while allowing that the government has enough evidence to prove his/her guilt beyond a reasonable doubt."
Basically, in an Alford plea, the defendant tells the judge they are innocent but agrees that the evidence is strong enough to convict them, usually to avoid a more severe sentence. The judge must find evidence of guilt and ensure the plea is a rational choice.
On Friday, Scott Hood admitted guilt using the Alford plea. Hood acknowledged in court that if a jury heard the evidence against him by the District Attorney, the jury could find him guilty.
The Blue Ridge District Attorney’s Office handled prosecuting for the State due to a conflict of interest should the local DA’s office prosecute the case. The Blue Ridge DA’s Office, which exclusively covers Cherokee County, Ga., was appointed to the case in 2022.
On Friday, the DA present explained to the court how Scott Hood's charges came about. The DA said that in January of 2021, Becky Hood's case originated from a DFCS report of child abuse on one of the female children in the Hood household. DFCS sent an investigator to the child's school to interview the child. The child told investigators that she had been disagreeing with her mom about getting a haircut when her mom, identified as Becky Hood, slung coffee on the child, grabbed the child by the hair, yanked the child to the ground and by doing so caused the child's head to strike the ground and kicked the child. During that DFCS interview, the investigator told the child that the children in the Hood home would need to be removed for a formal investigation. The child, panicked and scared, contacted a sister of Scott Hood, who met the child and her older sister at the home. The child and her older sister told their aunt what had happened in the incident with Becky Hood, then the older sister told their aunt that Scott Hood had molested her several years prior. The DA said that the older sister was then given a forensic interview, where the child explained that during a movie night in Scott and Becky Hood's bedroom several years prior when she was in the fifth grade, Scott Hood had inappropriately touched her in her pubic region. The forensic interview showed that the child could remember other events in that timeline, with the DA saying that the day after the alleged inappropriate touching by Scott Hood, the child was showing pigs at a local agricultural event and, according to the child, Scott Hood told her at that event, in, private that he didn't mean to touch her the night before and that she should never tell anyone about it.
Scott Hood was asked if he understood all the charges and the plea deal, and he admitted that he did. Judge Van Pelt accepted the plea deal, and agreed to the sentence of 5 years probation for Scott Hood under the Alford plea, with Hood having to register as a sex offender. As of Friday night, Scott Hood was already listed on the Sex Offender Registry.
Judge Van Pelt did not grant the DA’s request to deny Scott Hood to attend his teenage son’s high school events, such as sports. Those listed on the sex offender registry are usually not allowed to attend events where minors are present, such as events held on school grounds. The judge said that because Scott Hood has been attending the games over the past couple of years prior to his guilty plea and sentence, he could still attend school events as long as he is chaperoned by an adult. It was mentioned that the decision could change if the school had issues with it.
It was also noted that Scott Hood did not qualify for a first time offender plea.
Becky Hood pleaded guilty to the charge of misdemeanor Reckless Conduct, admitting that she was guilty of the charges brought against her. She was given probation of one year, a $1,000 fine and mandatory anger management and parenting classes, which she said she had already completed.
The plea deals come after several orders and six subpoenas were filed in the case in Gordon County Superior Court over the last couple of weeks. Those filings indicated that the minor victim in Scott Hood’s case would be recanting her story and the State was “required to prove intent and to rebut the minor victim’s recantation in the case.”
One of the orders filed on Feb. 3, 2026 and approved by the judge granted the State’s motion to present other acts of evidence against Scott Hood.
In Georgia, "other acts of evidence" refers to evidence of a person's prior crimes, wrongs or similar acts under OCGA § 24-4-404(b). While generally inadmissible to prove character, this evidence may be admitted for other purposes, such as proving motive, intent, plan, knowledge or identity.
The “other acts of evidence” listed in that particular order filed in court was alleged child molestation by Scott Hood against two female relatives who are now adults.
In the order, one female relative stated that Scott Hood “committed a rape against the female when she was around fourteen (14) years old.” The order also granted the State’s presentment of other acts of evidence concerning an alleged child molestation against the second female relative, who stated that Scott Hood would have this female relative “go to the basement and would touch her” inappropriately in her private areas “over the clothes when she was approximately eight (8) or nine (9) years old.” When this female was approximately eleven (11) or twelve (12) years old, she alleges Scott Hood “repeatedly asked her to have sex with him, even offering to use a condom.” The order stated that this victim “refused these requests, and the act of sexual intercourse did not occur.”
The second order filed also granted the State’s motion to present other acts of evidence, and presented testimony by a female relative of Scott Hood who alleges she witnessed Scott Hood “masturbating to a framed photo of his daughters, including the minor child who is the alleged victim in the State’s indictment.” The female relative stated in the order that in the photograph, “the alleged victim was approximately ten (10) years old at the time it was taken.” The alleged incident by Scott Hood was to have taken place a few years prior to the acts alleged in the indictment. This order states that “The Defendant (Scott Hood) denies that these acts occurred. The State is required to prove intent and to rebut the minor victim’s recantation in this case. The evidence here is relevant to show an alleged sexual fixation on this particular minor victim and is not merely character evidence. Therefore, the probative value outweighs any prejudicial effect.”
Scott and Becky Hood released a statement Friday through their attorney, Jason Hood. The statement said that Scott Hood denied the allegation made against him but wished to resolve the case to relieve the stress and anguish these charges and the pending trial have been placing on his family, and noted that the court allowing Scott Hood to enter a plea and be placed on probation without acknowledging factual guilt was a rare occurrence in Georgia.
Commissioners unanimously vote to place moratorium on data centers until
ULDC can be updated
TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 3, 2026 | Brandi Owczarz, Gordon Gazette
At the Tuesday night, Feb. 3, 2026 meeting of the Gordon County Board of Commissioners, all five members voted unanimously to place a moratorium on the building of data centers in the county until the Unified Land Development Code (ULDC) can be updated with regulations for the building and operations of such centers.
Commissioner Chad Steward suggested the moratorium during the data center discussion in Tuesday night’s work session, saying he was going to bring the motion before the Board in the regular meeting.
Gordon County’s Unified Land Development Code is a comprehensive set of local regulations governing land use, zoning and development within the unincorporated areas of the county. It uses building, zoning, and development ordinances to control density, land use and infrastructure, with the purpose of protecting public safety, the environment and controlling growth.
When the ULDC was written in 2009, there really was no such thing as data centers, and now that they are becoming a huge economic factor in the state, the county wants to be pro-active in regulating the construction and operating of any data centers if builders were to find interest in Gordon County.
Gordon County Administrator Jim Ledbetter made many of the same observations in the work session discussion Tuesday night that Community Development Director Derron Brown made two weeks ago in the original meeting that began data center discussion.
“Gordon County, right now, currently has zero regulations, ordinances or codes pertaining to data centers exclusive of whatever you might quantify a data center as,” said Ledbetter. “So if a data center is an industrial operation, a data center right now could locate in Gordon County under whatever rules we have for industrial. There are some locations that are allowing data centers in agricultural locations. So we are the Wild West right now. I don’t know of any specific data center project that is coming here, but I do know that there are data centers that are looking at Gordon County and every other county that can meet that sweet spot of adequate power and adequate gas and gas pipelines. Water is not as big a deal now because they’re going to these closed loop systems. So what does that mean? I know a lot of people are talking about this on social media; a lot of them are just flat wrong about data centers. So we’ve all been studying and taking seminars on this, I’ve looked at other state ordinances.”
The big three data center counties in Georgia - Jackson, Spalding and Wayne – caught Ledbetter’s attention and he has particularly been reviewing the ordinances pertaining to data centers in those counties. Ledbetter said that those three counties have state-of-the-art ordinances on data centers.
“The bottom line right now is, we have zero regulations in Gordon County pertaining to data centers,” said Ledbetter. “The reason for that is, these are relatively new. We need regulations. I don’t think data centers are all bad. There are data centers that might be noisy; they might have batteries that we don’t like the toxicity of or they might have high water consumption. The best data centers, the kind that we would want to attract, are not going to produce that type of noise and have built-in sound continuation, they’re going to have setbacks and vegetative buffers, they’ve got to have noise studies that are done, they will be no more than 55 decibels at the property line (normal speaking voice), they will have closed-loop systems and emergency plans with the right kind of fire suppression. They will be designed so they do not make a negative impact on the system.”
Ledbetter addressed those on social media who are saying the County should outlaw data centers.
“You know, we can do that but it’s only going to last as long as the law suit lasts,” said Ledbetter. “Then we will have a court telling us that we have to allow them and would have to allow them under our existing rules for which we have none right now, except for the general rules on industry.”
According to Ledbetter, Jackson County has good regulations on how to build data centers to not be a nuisance; while Spalding County has good regulations on closure and removal when a data center has ended its needs. He said that he wants to combine those two philosophies into one ordinance for a county ordinance in Gordon.
“That way, when data centers come, we will get the benefits of them and not the burdens,” said Ledbetter.
Ledbetter also mentioned Loudoun County, Virginia, where there are currently 200 data centers in that area alone. Ledbetter has studied that county extensively, saying that a seminar presentation on Loudoun County offered advice such as, there must be restrictions on power usage, there must be a power usage plan, a water closed loop system and other needs. The good thing about Loudoun is that the county has a $1 billion dollar budget, with $900 million of that budget coming in from data center revenue.
“We guesstimate that in Gordon County, if we had three to five data centers, or three to four data centers, our millage rate could be reduced to next to zero,” said Ledbetter. “That is, we would have no ad valorem taxation or very small ad valorem taxation.”
Ledbetter said that right now, our neighbors are getting data centers, mentioning Bartow and Floyd counties.
“People are saying (date centers) are going to use up electricity (if placed in Gordon),” said Ledbetter. “Well, they’re going to use it up next door; electricity is regional. Electricity is a Southern region thing. They are sucking that electricity up in Adairsville from Gordon County. People say, ‘what about our water resources?’ Well, we require a closed-loop system that will have minimal impact. You can have environmental rules to protect the environment. Right now, these are the types of things we are looking at. But right now, we don’t have any of those rules.”
Ledbetter said that the social media comments from people saying data centers will ruin the environment could be true in certain circumstances if strict regulations are not put in place.
“That wouldn’t be true if you get the right data centers,” said Ledbetter. “If you get the right spot with the right regulations, it would be a money maker for Gordon County. The Loudoun County, Virginia guy was explaining that data centers basically consume four cents of county budget for every dollar of revenue the county would generate. Residential neighborhoods, on the other hand, basically consume every penny they generate in tax revenue, and I think industrial and commercial generate around 40 cents on the dollar.”
“There are many counties around the state that are facing this (issue) and each county is looking at it differently,” said Commission Chair Bud Owens.
Steward said that he has been keeping an eye on the bills moving around at the state legislative session concerning data centers.
As the Gazette reported last week, legislators have already proposed seven bills that would attempt to regulate data centers by eliminating tax breaks, prohibit costs from being passed on to residential electricity customers or temporarily halting their construction.
“There are a lot of concerns within those bills about protecting citizens,” said Steward. “That being said, in the regular meeting, I’m going to make a motion that we put a moratorium on data centers so we can work on making sure we are protecting our citizens.”
Once the regular meeting began, Steward did bring that motion and all five commissioners voted to approve a moratorium on the building of data centers until the ULDC can be updated.