On May 29, Roger Wehner, Amazon Web Services’ Vice President of Economic Development, published a guest view in this newspaper on the company’s data center under construction in Gilroy. Americans for Transparency attended Amazon’s June 3 open house at Gilroy High School.
We brought copies of Amazon’s own certified environmental record. We asked questions on video. Here is what the record shows.
Two numbers that cannot both be true
Mr. Wehner wrote that this campus will use approximately 4 million gallons of water per year—“roughly equivalent to the water used by 36 households.”
Amazon’s certified Final Environmental Impact Report says otherwise. The Water Supply Assessment (Appendix O, page ES-1)—Amazon’s sworn environmental record submitted to the city—states the project will use 7,494,550 gallons per year (23 acre-feet) at full buildout. That is nearly double Mr. Wehner’s figure.
FEIR page 186 breaks it down: 18 acre-feet per year (AFY) for cooling, 3 AFY for landscaping, 2 AFY for domestic use—all drawn from Gilroy’s potable water supply until a recycled water pipeline is operational.
At the open house, Amazon representatives acknowledged on video that the numbers had changed, attributing the difference to improved technology. When I asked whether a post-certification change of this magnitude triggers a supplemental environmental review under CEQA Guidelines Section 15162, they could not answer.
The 36-household comparison also obscures the relevant question. Gilroy faces drought-year water deficits.
At the FEIR’s certified 23 acre-feet, this facility consumes a meaningful share of the city’s drought-year margin. Households are not the right unit of comparison for a municipal water stress analysis.
No enforcement of recycled water
Mr. Wehner’s op-ed stated Amazon is funding infrastructure to transition to 100% reclaimed water by 2030. At the open house, an Amazon representative confirmed on video that the original projected completion date was 2023—a seven-year slip Mr. Wehner did not disclose.
When I asked what binding mechanism—permit condition, recorded covenant or signed agreement with Valley Water—guarantees the 2030 deadline and specifies consequences if it slips again, Amazon’s representative could not answer.
The facility will run on Gilroy’s potable groundwater for at least four more years.
Jobs figure also contradicts record
Mr. Wehner stated this project creates “about 90 on-site jobs.” The certified Draft EIR, Section 2.5.10, page 23, states: “Once Phase II of the project is complete, operational employment may grow to 50 full-time employees.”
That is an 80% discrepancy between Amazon’s promotional materials and the document Amazon submitted to the city under penalty of law. The employee count is a direct input to the traffic study and Vehicle Miles Traveled analysis. If the real number is 90, the environmental review used the wrong baseline.
Upcoming council meeting must be productive
Council members Marques and Ramirez deserve credit for initiating a discussion on the data center project for the June 15 city council meeting. Their FAIR Memo correctly identified the structural gap: this project was approvable by one administrative signature under the current zoning code, with no public hearing and no council vote.
That will remain true for the next project of this scale unless the ordinance changes.
Better communication from Amazon is not the fix. An ordinance amendment is the fix.
Gilroy residents should ask the council on June 15 to direct staff, as part of the ongoing Zoning Ordinance update, to draft a threshold provision requiring city council approval for industrial projects above a defined scale—and to present that draft for public comment before the update is finalized.
Phase Two of this project has not been permitted. The window is open. Use it.
Gilroy resident Georgine Scott-Codiga is the founder of Americans for Transparency. Contact her at AF***@****on.me.
