The letter below was originally sent by the author to members of the Gilroy City Council.
My name is Adriana Leongardt. I am a Gilroy resident, a former City of Gilroy Planning Commissioner, and a Project Engineer who has built data centers in Santa Clara County—including direct work with the same construction group responsible for this project.
I am not here to speculate. I am here because I know exactly what is being built, who is building it, and what it will cost this community. And I am here because what happened on July 3, 2025 was wrong.
On the eve of Independence Day, Gilroy’s Community Development Director Sharon Goei approved a 438,000-square-foot, 49-megawatt Amazon data center—without a City Council vote, without a Planning Commission review, without notifying a single resident.
I worked alongside Sharon Goei. She understood the magnitude of this project. She understood this community’s right to participate. She breached public trust—and it demands accountability.
I have built these facilities; hear me clearly: Data centers in Santa Clara County are served by Silicon Valley Power—a purpose-built, dedicated utility grid designed specifically for industrial-scale demand. Even with that infrastructure, I personally witnessed millions of gallons of water lost to leaks.
The gray water supply is already chemically overtaxed just to remain functional, and the supply of it is drying out. Gilroy has no infrastructure built for what is coming.
This facility will draw 49 MW of power—enough to run 20,000 homes—from a grid that is not designed for it. It will consume 7.5 million gallons of water per year from a supply already under drought pressure.
Phase One brings 25 diesel generators. Phase Two brings large-scale lithium-ion battery systems that, as the International Association of Firefighters has documented, create fire scenarios our local departments cannot handle.
The staff who signed off on this have never evaluated a data center. They did not know the right questions. Gilroy’s residents will pay that price—in utility bills, water shortages and emergencies we are not prepared for.
The promise of jobs is fiction. I am telling you from inside the industry. Once construction ends, a facility like this employs a handful of full-time workers on site. The rest of the “jobs” in project plans? Periodic visits from out-of-town technicians who check systems and leave.
That is not employment. That is not economic development. What we gave away was 56 acres—in a city with a housing crisis, where families are being priced out and young people cannot afford to stay.
That land could have housed hundreds of Gilroy families. Instead, it was handed to a trillion-dollar corporation on a holiday weekend, with no public meeting, no community vote and no debate.
Gilroy’s identity is on the line. We have nearly 40 wineries. Our agricultural heritage is not decoration—it is our economy, our identity and our future. Data centers of this scale generate industrial heat, alter humidity and extract water at volumes that directly threaten the microclimate our vineyards depend on.
This was never studied. Never disclosed. Never debated—because we were never given the chance. Gilroy cannot be a wine country and a data center corridor. That is a choice. It was made for us, in secret, on a holiday weekend.
That ends now. WE DEMAND: An immediate moratorium on all new data center approvals in Gilroy. An independent third-party audit—water, power, air quality, fire safety, agricultural impact and a truthful count of permanent local jobs. A formal investigation into the approval process and the conduct of those who bypassed the Planning Commission, the City Council and the public.
Disciplinary accountability for officials who circumvented democratic process. Mandatory public review and a Council vote for any project exceeding 10 MW or 1 million gallons of water annually. A land use policy that puts housing and agriculture before corporate infrastructure.
I served this city as a Planning Commissioner because I believed in the processes that protect it. I know that Gilroy was not ready, was not informed and was not asked.
This Council can stand with the people who live here—or stand with the decision that was made without them. Choose wisely.
Adriana Leongardt
Gilroy
