Blue Island Residents Give Owner's Rep An Earful About Proposed Data Center

BLUE ISLAND, IL—Blue Island residents showed up in force at Tuesday’s city council meeting after word got out that a developer’s representative wanted to meet council members about building a data center on the former Metro South Hospital site.

Tom Wogan, the Blue Island city administrator, said in an email to Patch that nothing was submitted for Tuesday’s meeting and nothing was on the agenda.

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“A representative for the company asked to speak to the council. The agenda was already posted, so I told them if they want to address the council in public comment, they can,” Wogan said.

Noting the community’s strong passionate feelings about the subject, Wogan added, “The social media rumor machine is running a little hot.”

Mayor Fred Bilotto reiterated to residents that no plans have yet been submitted to the city council. He said there will be plenty of opportunities for dialogue with residents about a data center or other redevelopment plan for the hospital site.

“I've said it four times now, nothing's been submitted. The situation would be, if something were submitted, it would have to go through the planning and zoning board of appeals,” Bilotto said. “First and foremost, nothing has been submitted to that committee. Therefore, nothing can be sent to the city council committee or city council to even discuss certain things, have dialogue with, or vote on anything because nothing has been submitted yet.”

Rolland Dawson, the owner’s representative for Builders Capital, which currently owns the 12-acre hospital site at 12935 Gregory St., explained that he specialized in “failed developments.” Dawson, who said he was meeting “transparently,” lamented all the past failed attempts to redevelop the Metro South Medical Center, which cost $80 million and is now in receivership.

“We do own the site at this point, and we intend to redevelop it in a way that's viable and kind of make up for failures over the last five years,” Dawson told council members during public comments. “I wanted to take this opportunity to introduce myself and our team. Builders Capital and their joint lenders in New York City have a solid, great plan and high hopes for developing what Blue Island would like to see at that location.”

Dawson also introduced Jackson Metcalf, an architect for Chicago-based Gensler, a design firm that has built data centers around the United States and Canada, including the HydroVault data center in a restored masonry building in Chicago’s South Loop.

Bilotto reminded Dawson that nothing was up for debate or discussion during public comments, but he wouldn’t stop a council member from asking a question if they wanted.

“So it was brought to our attention that you were contemplating a data center,” city treasurer Nancy Rita asked.

“This is our current plan,” Dawson said to boos from the audience.

Dawson said the 600,000-square-foot building has deteriorated after standing vacant for six years. He said healthcare has advanced since the 1950s and 1960s when the hospital was first designed, so it has become obsolete.

“Right now, we're spending about four, $400,000 a month doing nothing with the site, by taking responsibility for it,” Dawson said. “And obviously that's not sustainable.”

Blue Island resident Marie Mindemann proposed delaying the consideration of a data center until the pending completion of the IL POWER ACT (SB 4103 and HB 5513). The bill would would require data centers to pay for their energy and invest in renewable generation, report water usage, and work with the communities where they’re built. It also bolsters consumer protections for price increases, electricity shortages and environmental impacts.

“When I think of communities for a person like myself to age in where I'm looking for quality of life, the idea of a data center is not something that I have pictured over the years,” Mindemann said. “Otherwise, this type of chicanery will resemble what we saw with the hospital when the decision to close a hospital that was very functional was made due to private equity decisions.”

Resident Veronica Cullinan implored the city council to find its "moral compass" when considering future development.

“We are not dumb,” Cullinan said, turning to Dawson. “We're not a small town that people can come in and convince us of things that we know are not true. We are not stupid. We are not dumb.”

Resident Joao Oliva said there would be a mass exodus of people moving out of the town if a data center were to be built in the center of town, making Blue Island a "footnote" in history.

“I want to tell the gentleman [Dawson] behind this that we will mobilize and we will protest against this idea,” Oliva said. “I just can’t imagine why a data center would be built there. It's offensive to try to tell us that there's no other viable option.”

A Blue Island alderperson shared with Patch when word got out earlier Tuesday that the “data center people” would be at the city council meeting that Dawson left them a voicemail asking to meet.

The alderperson said they hadn’t yet returned Dawson’s call.

Patch has reached out to Dawson for comment.