What Lavon Should Do Right Now
Nothing here argues for or against a data center. It argues that the rules should get written while the window is open.
The Dates
- Sep 15First public hearing, 6:30 p.m., City Hall. Set by notice published Aug 13, 2026.
- Oct 20Second hearing, written findings, first reading. The findings are the most important document in the process.
- Nov 3Election. Three council seats, and an MDD that does not include these 79 acres.
- Nov 17Second reading. Needs three-fourths of all members. Exactly 28 days after Oct 20, the legal minimum.
- Then 90 daysThat is all a moratorium lasts. 180 days is the absolute maximum, and then a two-year lockout.
Miss the window and the city may not adopt the ordinance at all. Texas Local Government Code § 212.134(f).
Three Asks of Council
- Get the nine-year freeze answer in writing. The Business Park standards freeze on Parcel 9 began in October 2022 and runs to roughly October 2031; Parcel 8 has a parallel clause. The City says relevant code changes were approved. A written opinion settles what a new citywide rule reaches.
- Adopt Mesquite's noise numbers and its closed-loop cooling sentence. 65 dBA day, 60 night, 55 at night next to homes, plus 55 dB caps at 16, 31.5 and 63 Hz. Adopted July 20, 2026, 30 miles away, and copyable tomorrow.
- Fix the abatement policy, and post it on the website. No percentage cap, no jobs number, and a clawback that only bites on unpaid taxes. Posting it is already required by Tax Code § 312.002(c-2).
Three Things Residents Can Do
- Put a comment in the record, in writing. Email cityhall@lavontx.gov and ask that it be included in the record for the item and provided to the Council. Writing carries a citation and a figure in a way three minutes at a microphone cannot.
- Go to the September 15 hearing. 6:30 p.m., City Hall, 120 School Road. The notice ran in The Wylie News on August 13, so the date is set. Ask for a number, not a promise.
- Say your view out loud, whatever it is. Opposition organizes by default. Support stays home. A council can only weigh what turns up in front of it.
Every line above has the working behind it, sourced, below. Open whichever one you need. Nobody has to read all three.
1
The Clock
Every date that matters, and what the statute does if one is missed
On August 6, 2026 the City Council voted unanimously to begin the process for a temporary moratorium on data center development, under Section 212.1352 of the Texas Local Government Code. Rachel Dumas moved, Lindsey Hedge seconded, Mike Cook was absent. The motion in the minutes reads: approve moving forward with the process for a temporary moratorium. It was not a moratorium, and there is not one today. Coverage at the time that described Lavon as having approved a 90-day moratorium was describing something that has not happened yet.
What follows is the schedule the City Attorney presented that night, checked line by line against the statute it has to satisfy and against what the city has actually published since. The notice has now been published, which settles the two rows that looked shakiest when this page was written. One row is still shaded amber, and it is the one with no room left in it.
The Schedule, and Where It Stands
| Date | What Is Supposed to Happen | Where It Stands |
|---|---|---|
| Aug 6, 2026 | Council receives a report from the City Attorney and votes whether to begin the process. | Done. Unanimous, one member absent. The motion was to approve moving forward with the process, not to adopt a moratorium. |
| Aug 13, 2026 | Publication and mailing of the Notice of Public Hearings, per the City's own draft schedule. | Done. Published in The Wylie News, confirmed by the publisher's sworn affidavit. The notice names both hearings, sets both for 6:30 p.m. in the Council Chambers, and describes a moratorium on data centers specifically. |
| Aug 16, 2026 | Statutory deadline. Notice must be published at least 30 days before a hearing (§ 212.134(b)). | Met. August 13 is 33 days before September 15. |
| Aug 25, 2026 | Planning and Zoning Commission regular meeting. | Agenda posted August 19. No data center or moratorium item on it. Next P&Z meeting is September 22. |
| Sep 1, 2026 | Next regular City Council meeting. | Agenda not yet posted as of August 24. |
| Sep 15, 2026 | First public hearing on the moratorium. | Noticed. 6:30 p.m., Council Chambers, 120 School Road. The city has separately set this same evening for its budget and tax rate hearings. |
| Oct 20, 2026 | Second public hearing, plus the written findings and the first reading of the ordinance. | Noticed. 6:30 p.m., same chambers. May be held no earlier than 30 days after the first hearing (§ 212.134(c)). |
| Nov 1, 2026 | Statutory deadline. The final determination must have begun within 12 days of the second hearing (§ 212.134(f)). | Derived from an October 20 second hearing. |
| Nov 3, 2026 | Election day. Three council seats and the Municipal Development District proposition. | A separate track. See below. |
| Nov 17, 2026 | Second reading and final vote. Needs three-fourths of all members. | Exactly 28 days after October 20, which is the statutory minimum gap. There is no slack in it. |
| About Feb 15, 2027 | The moratorium expires on the 90th day after adoption, unless extended by a further hearing and further written findings. | § 212.1362. |
| About May 16, 2027 | 180 days is the aggregate maximum, extensions included. | § 212.1362. |
| Two years after that | No new moratorium addressing the same harm, the same property type, or the same area. | § 212.1362. |
Statute citations are to Chapter 212, Subchapter E of the Texas Local Government Code, as amended by House Bill 2559 in 2025. The draft schedule and the code excerpt are both printed in the August 6, 2026 City Council agenda packet, pages 152 to 154. Meeting dates and posted agendas are from the packets themselves.
The Other Track: November 3
Two separate things are on the ballot that day, and neither of them is the moratorium. They are being discussed together around town, and they are not connected.
What Is Lost if the Window Closes with Nothing Adopted
- The moratorium itself, permanently for this round. Section 212.134(f) says that if the council does not adopt within the prescribed period, the municipality may not adopt the ordinance. Starting over means another 30-day notice, another two hearings 30 days apart, and another two readings 28 days apart. Call it three and a half months, from scratch.
- Two years, if a moratorium is adopted and then expires with nothing written. Section 212.1362 bars a second moratorium addressing the same harm, the same property type, or the same geographic area before the second anniversary of the first one's expiration. Spending the pause and producing no ordinance is the worst available outcome, because it also spends the ability to try again.
- Nothing else. This is the part worth being blunt about. A noise limit, a cooling standard, a Dark Sky resolution and a fixed abatement policy can all be adopted on an ordinary agenda in an ordinary month, with or without a moratorium in effect. The pause buys time to write them. Everything in Part 2 survives the moratorium failing.
2
For the City
The ordinance work, in priority order, with the model text
This is the ordinance work, in the order it should be done. None of it decides whether a data center should be built. All of it applies to whatever gets built on those 79 acres, including nothing, and most of it applies to the rest of Lavon too.
Each item says the same four things: what it is, why it matters, what text to start from, and who owns it. None of this is legal advice. It is assembled from adopted ordinances and statutes, by an engineer rather than a lawyer, which is exactly why the first item is a question instead of an instruction.
Get It in Writing Which New Citywide Rules Can Reach These Parcels
Do this firstA written answer to one question. Section 1.3.58 holds Parcel 9 to the Business Park standards as they existed when the planned development was adopted, for nine years. The City advises that this period began in October 2022, which puts its end at roughly October 2031, and that it pertains to Parcel 9. Section 1.3.53 carries a parallel nine-year clause for Parcel 8, measured against the Business Park or Retail standards.
The City has also said that in most relevant areas, changes were approved in the code. That narrows this item considerably. What is left is to have it confirmed on paper: whether a noise ordinance, a cooling standard or a lighting rule adopted in 2026 reaches these parcels, and which already-approved code changes do.
Several items below hang on it. The city could adopt a good ordinance in November that does not reach the one property it was written for. An email summary is not ordinance text, which is why this is worth having in writing and in a packet where residents can read it.
- Ordinance No. 2022-10-03, carried into Ordinance No. 2024-12-01 at Sections 1.3.53 and 1.3.58. The clauses themselves. Exhibit G to the 2024 amendment is the frozen set of city code excerpts, and it is dated October 18, 2022.
- Tex. Loc. Gov't Code § 245.004(2). The list of categories that freeze when a developer files: landscaping or tree preservation, open space or park dedication, property classification, lot size, lot dimensions, lot coverage, and building size. Noise, lighting, equipment setbacks, cooling type and disclosure are not on that list, and nothing has been filed here anyway.
- Mesquite ZTA 2026-01, Section 3.514.A.3. Mesquite's own drafters concluded that a Conditional Use Permit is not required where a Planned Development already approves a data center by right. That is precisely Lavon's situation, and it is a live example of another city's attorney reaching a conclusion on the same question.
The City Attorney, asked by the Council in an open meeting, answered in writing and placed in a packet where residents can read it.
When: before the second public hearing on October 20, so the written findings can be drafted around the answer rather than in spite of it.
A Noise Ordinance with Actual Numbers in It
Day and night decibel limits measured at the receiving property line, plus separate caps on low-frequency sound, which is the part ordinary readings miss.
Lavon has no decibel limit at all. Ordinance 2005-06-02, as amended by 2017-11-01, is qualitative: it prohibits noise offensive to ordinary sensibilities, sets time-of-day restrictions, and caps the fine at $200. There is no number in it.
State law does not fill the gap. It presumes noise unreasonable only above 85 decibels, which is a chainsaw, and offers nothing at all against a steady mechanical hum at 60. A rule with no number in it is unenforceable in practice, and courts have struck down vaguer versions.
The City has said it is working on noise and other protections, to be presented once the moratorium is finalized or nearer to it. Of everything on this list, this is the item most likely to be already in hand.
Mesquite ZTA 2026-01, recommended by Planning and Zoning on June 22, 2026 and adopted by the City Council on July 20, 2026. New Mesquite Zoning Ordinance Section 3.514.L. Mesquite is a home rule city, like Lavon, about 30 miles away. The adopted numbers:
| What is limited | The number |
|---|---|
| Daytime, 7:00 a.m. to 10:00 p.m. | 65 dBA |
| Nighttime, 10:01 p.m. to 6:59 a.m. | 60 dBA |
| Nighttime, where the site adjoins a residential district | 55 dBA |
| Low frequency, 16 Hz | 55 dB |
| Low frequency, 31.5 Hz | 55 dB |
| Low frequency, 63 Hz | 55 dB |
| Generator enclosure, measured 25 feet away | 70 dBA |
Where it is measured is half the rule. The dBA limits apply “at the property line of the Data Center or at the exterior wall of the nearest occupied residential structure, whichever produces the higher reading.” The low-frequency caps are measured the same way, per ANSI S12.9 Part 4, using a Class 1 sound level meter with octave band filters. A limit measured at the wrong place is not a limit.
The ordinance also requires the study, not just the limit: a sound modeling study by a licensed professional engineer specializing in acoustics or an engineer Board Certified by the Institute of Noise Control Engineers; full octave and one-third octave analysis; a tonality assessment; modeling at full load and at ultimate build-out if the project is phased; and a follow-up study within 60 days of the building opening, with an obligation to correct.
Mesquite exempts routine generator testing from its own decibel limits. That is the loophole in an otherwise strong text. A limit that does not apply on the days the generators run is not a limit on the days a neighbor would notice. Cap the testing hours, or apply the limit to testing, or both.
Staff and the City Attorney draft it. Planning and Zoning recommends. Council adopts. This is the item with the widest reach, because a citywide noise standard applies to every industrial use on both parcels, and to the rest of Lavon, and to whatever is built next after that.
Closed-loop Cooling, Written as a Land-use Standard
One sentence. Mesquite's, verbatim, from new MZO Section 3.514.N.1:
“Only closed-loop or recycled water cooling systems are permitted for Data Center cooling operations. The use of potable water from the City's municipal water system for open evaporative or once-through cooling that discharges to waste is prohibited.”
The water question in the report turns almost entirely on one design choice. Evaporative and closed-loop cooling differ by a factor of hundreds, not by a percentage. Written down as a rule, the argument stops being an argument.
Mesquite ZTA 2026-01, Sections 3.514.N.1 and N.2. N.2 is the disclosure half and should travel with it: the applicant must disclose anticipated monthly and annual water consumption in the utility demand analysis, and provide written confirmation of available capacity from the water utility before final site plan approval.
It is a land-use standard, not a building code. Texas bars cities from regulating building products, materials or methods more strictly than the national model codes, which is why a LEED mandate or a hard efficiency score is legally risky here. A rule about how a site may use water is a different kind of rule. Mesquite's has been on the books since July and has not been challenged.
Same route as item 1, and it should ride in the same ordinance rather than waiting for its own.
A Dark Sky Intent Resolution
A council resolution stating the city's intent to become certified as a Dark Sky Community under the International Dark Sky Places Program. One agenda item, one vote, no cost.
It is the cheapest item on this list and it buys authority the city does not otherwise have.
Texas Government Code Section 3000.002 voids city rules that regulate building products, materials or aesthetic methods more strictly than national model codes. Subsection (c)(3)(B) carves out an outdoor lighting ordinance adopted to reduce light pollution “by a governmental entity that has adopted a resolution stating the entity's intent to become certified as a Dark Sky Community.”
No resolution, no exemption. For a 24-hour facility with security lighting across 79 acres, ten houses on the property line, that is not a small thing.
Tex. Gov't Code § 3000.002(c)(3)(B). Several Texas cities have already adopted the resolution and their text can be copied.
The same subsection says the lighting ordinance may not be more restrictive than what certification actually requires. So the resolution opens a door, and the door has a frame around it. It also does not commit the city to pursuing certification.
Council. This one does not need Planning and Zoning and does not need the moratorium.
Fix the Tax Abatement Policy While Nobody Is Asking for One
Three additions to guidelines that already exist. A cap on the abatement percentage. A jobs requirement with a number in it. And a clawback that bites on something other than unpaid taxes.
Lavon adopted abatement guidelines in 2020 and renewed them by Resolution 2025-07-10 on July 15, 2025. The renewal hearing opened and closed in the same minute, with no public comment.
The policy sets exactly two limits: a term of no more than ten years, and a minimum investment of $10 million. Beyond that it is open. No cap on the abatement percentage. No jobs requirement with a number in it. No use restrictions, no water conditions, no power conditions. And the only recapture it provides for is if the applicant fails to pay its taxes, which is not an investment clawback and is not a jobs clawback.
Tex. Tax Code § 312.205. Subsection (a)(4) requires an agreement to “provide for recapturing property tax revenue lost as a result of the agreement if the owner of the property fails to make the improvements or repairs as provided by the agreement.” Subsection (b)(6) makes optional the recapture that bites if the owner “fails to create all or a portion of the number of new jobs provided by the agreement.”
Optional means: if you do not write it in, it does not exist. El Paso did not. Its December 2023 agreement, $800 million of investment for 50 permanent jobs, says the city's sole remedy is to terminate and that the company “will not be required to repay any Abatement.” Across the whole state registry, roughly 26 percent of agreements carry a clawback flag and 66 percent carry none.
Tex. Tax Code § 312.002(c): guidelines are effective for two years from the date adopted, and during that period may be amended or repealed only by a vote of three-fourths of the members of the governing body.
Lavon's run to about July 15, 2027. So amending them needs the same supermajority the moratorium does, which is an argument for putting it on an agenda early rather than discovering the vote threshold late.
Council, on its own motion. Fixing an abatement policy with an applicant in the room costs leverage. Fixing it now costs an agenda item. This is the clearest example on the page of something that is free today and expensive later.
Put the Abatement Guidelines on the City Website
Uploading a PDF.
State law requires it. Tex. Tax Code § 312.002(c-2): “A taxing unit that maintains an Internet website shall post the current version of the guidelines and criteria governing tax abatement agreements adopted under this section on the website.”
Today Lavon's exist only inside old agenda packets, which are not linked from any index page on the city site and have to be found by guessing the file name.
Here is what that costs, from my own research. Partway through writing the report I had concluded that Lavon had no abatement policy at all. It does, and it has had one since 2020. It simply could not be found where a resident would look for it, which is the exact problem the statute was written to solve.
Staff. This is the shortest item on the list, it needs no vote, and it is the one that is simply overdue.
What Is Deliberately Not on This List
Four things that come up often, left off on purpose, with the reason in each case.
3
For Residents
What to do, where to send it, and what to ask for
1The Dates, Now That the Notice Has Been Published
The notice was published in The Wylie News on August 13, 2026. It sets a first public hearing on Tuesday, September 15, 2026 at 6:30 p.m. and a second on Tuesday, October 20, 2026 at 6:30 p.m., both in the Council Chambers at City Hall, 120 School Road. Both dates are now fixed by published notice rather than by a draft schedule.
The notice asks that residents and affected parties make their views known in person, in writing, or through a representative. The city's number is 972-843-4220 and the address for questions is cityhall@lavontx.gov.
The next regular Council meeting is September 1. The next Planning and Zoning meeting is September 22. Neither posted agenda carries a data center item.
2How to Be Part of the Record
Two ways, and they are not the same thing.
One practical note either way. Read the packet before you speak on the item. Agenda packets are posted before each meeting and they contain the staff brief, the statute excerpts and the draft schedule. Much of the disagreement in this town has been about facts that are not actually in dispute, and reading the brief is how you stop being one of the people repeating a wrong number.
3What to Actually Say
The single most useful thing a resident can do at these hearings is ask for a number instead of a promise. A decibel limit written into an ordinance outlives a change of council and a change of owner. An assurance given at a meeting does not.
These are the questions worth putting on the record, written so that the answers can be checked afterward rather than simply believed at the time. The first four are new since the report; the rest come from Section 9.
- Can a new citywide noise or lighting rule reach Parcel 9 before the nine-year Business Park freeze runs out in about October 2031? The City has said relevant code changes were approved. This one should come back in writing, and should cover Parcel 8 under Section 1.3.53 as well.
- Which code changes were approved that already reach these parcels? The City has said that in most relevant areas, changes were approved in the code. The useful answer names the ordinances. (New question.)
- Who is drafting the written findings required by Section 212.1352(b), and will they be in the packet before the second hearing rather than handed out at it? (New question.)
- If the moratorium is not adopted in time, which of these ordinances can still be adopted on a normal agenda? (New question. The answer should be: all of them.)
- Has anything been filed for this land, and when?
- What would it take for Lavon to have an actual decibel limit, and what would enforcing one cost in equipment and staff time?
- What did the City ask for, and get, in December 2024 when this zoning was approved?
- If a buyer appears, what approvals would they still need from the Council?
- How many permanent jobs, and how many of those are the operator's own employees rather than contractors?
- How many backup generators, and how many hours a year will they run for testing?
- Which sales-tax exemption tier would a project certify under, and does the City see any of its two percent?
- How does a resident who supports a project make that known?
4The Room Nobody Is In
Almost none of this conversation has happened at a school board meeting.
The district is also not in the TIRZ. The agreement that shares 45 percent of the City's tax increment does not touch the school district's share, and the words “school district” do not appear in the plan at all. Community ISD is not a recapture district today, but it sits about $91 million of taxable value from the line, which a large project would cross on day one.
So the largest single recipient of whatever property tax those 79 acres generate is a body that has not been part of this discussion at all. Their meetings are public too, and nothing in Part 2 requires their permission or gives them a vote. It is simply a room where a large share of the money lands and nobody has shown up.
5If You Support Something, You Have to Say So
This is not a comment about which side is right. It is a fact about how public bodies work.
Opposition to a specific project organizes itself, because there is a specific thing to organize against. Support usually stays home, because there is nothing to show up to. A council can only weigh what turns up in front of it, and “nobody spoke in favor” reads to a council exactly like “nobody is in favor.”
If you would rather see a data center than another four hundred houses, that is worth three minutes. If you would rather see shops, that is worth three minutes. If your view is that the city should write the rules and then let the market decide, that is a position too, and it is arguably the position this entire document is organized around.
6Check These Numbers
Every figure in this document traces to a city document, a statute, or a named section of the report. Most of them you can pull yourself, and here is the awkward part: agenda packets are not linked from any index page on the city website. You get them by building the address.
Council packets follow this pattern, with the meeting date in front:
lavontx.gov/wp-content/uploads/Public-Documents/ City Council Agendas/YYYY-MM-DD-Agenda-CC-Meeting-Packet.pdf
They run 20 to 40 megabytes, so they are a wait on a phone. And the piece of local-government trivia that does the most work: the minutes of a meeting appear in the next meeting's packet, on the consent agenda. That is how you find out how a vote actually went, and it is where the August 6 motion quoted at the top of Part 1 comes from.