(La Porte, IN) - The City of LaPorte is preparing for a major long-term influx of construction workers that will start building a Microsoft data center next month.
A groundbreaking on the over $1 billion investment was held Wednesday at the 500 acre site on Boyd Boulevard where grading of what’s been farmland has been occurring for several weeks to prepare for the upcoming construction.
Bo Wallace, a Microsoft corporate vice-president, said the goal is begin operating out of three buildings in 2029 followed by three additional structures on the site “as fast as we can build them.”
Wallace said it’s going to take over 600 full-time employees to operate and maintain all six of the facilities. Plans call for another 11 data center structures to start going up later on 1,300 acres of farmland Microsoft is purchasing adjacent to the site. It’s going to take up to 10-years to complete the construction at both locations.
Eventually, Wallace said more than 2,000 construction workers will be at the site daily once the job fully ramps up.
LaPorte Economic Advancement Partnership Executive Director Bert Cook said building construction will begin in less than 30 days. He said local hotels, restaurants, grocery stores and gas stations are among the businesses given notice already about the upcoming work so they can prepare for the potential of more customers.
“We want to be prepared as we possibly can be for that,” he said.
Microsoft decided earlier this year not to seek tax abatement on any of its data center projects nationwide.
For LaPorte, the full payout on the first completed site will mean tens of millions of dollars annually for the city and several million dollars a year for the school corporation under a 20-year agreement with Microsoft.
The city, school corporation and county government will receive property tax dollars from the other site under a separate agreement. The exact amounts will not be known until the properties as they’re being developed have their current values reassessed for tax billing purposes.
Mayor Tom Dermody said the amount of new tax dollars locally from the project is unprecedented.
“Microsoft’s historic investment in LaPorte surpasses all private investment ever made in our city’s history, combined,” he said.
Brad Smith, Vice-Chair and President of Microsoft, said the company and school corporation will partner on offering classes at the high school that prepare students for the high-tech jobs offered at the data center complex for years to come. Smith said the jobs are well-paying and give students looking elsewhere for opportunity a reason to stay.
“That, in some ways, may be the longest-lasting and most important thing we do here. If so, we’ll be proud to be a part of it,” he said.
The city is also collecting another $17 million from Microsoft because over 100 acres of municipally owned land is part of the 1,300 acres the tech giant is purchasing. The city used the land for spreading manure from its nearby waste water treatment plant and to contract with a farmer to grow crops.
Dermody and many other leaders in the community believe the data center complex will transform the city, which has been pushing aggressively for new growth and seeing positive results in areas like new housing over the past several years.
He called the groundbreaking one of those moments that define the future of a community.
“This is a day when generations of LaPorte residents will look back and remember a day when a global leader chose to invest in our city, our people and our future,” Dermody said.
La Porte Schools Superintendent Dr. Sandra Wood said the money from Microsoft will mean financial stability again for the corporation which has been dealing with revenue losses from gradual enrollment declines over roughly the past decade. The school board considered asking voters to approve a property tax increase to help with cash flow but dropped the idea because of the revenue coming from Microsoft.
“That’s going to be a game changer for us,” said LaPorte School Board member Jim Arnold.
