By Paige Orr, FOX23.com News Staff
TULSA, Okla. — A high-stakes battle over the future of East Tulsa neighborhoods is on hold after the Tulsa Metropolitan Area Planning Commission (TMAPC) voted Wednesday to delay a decision on a massive industrial expansion.
The proposal, part of the “Project Anthem” data center development, seeks to rezone approximately 375 acres of land near East 11th Street and South 193rd East Avenue. While developers envision a massive industrial hub, city planners and local residents are signaling a firm “denial.”
The meeting room at City Hall was packed with neighbors who took time off work to oppose the project. However, they were met with a procedural hurdle when the attorney for the applicant requested a continuance to address concerns raised in a recent city staff report.
“We’ve asked for this continuance in order to prepare more information to address the concerns raised by staff in the report,” said applicant attorney Lou Reynolds. “We couldn’t have time to get that done in time for today’s meeting.”
The delay drew immediate fire from the public. Because the commission granted the request for more time, the 13 residents who signed up to speak were restricted by the board to commenting only on the timeline of the delay, rather than the merits of the project itself.
“I’m also against the continuance. Nothing about two weeks is going to change the way we feel about this center going in in our community,” said resident Robert Ross during the public comment portion of the meeting.
At the heart of the conflict is a disagreement over how East Tulsa should grow. The land is currently designated for “Neighborhood” use, earmarked for future houses, small businesses, and parks. The developers are asking the city to flip that designation to “Employment” to allow for the industrial scale of a data center.
Tulsa city planners have taken the rare step of officially recommending a denial of the application, arguing that the shift would effectively cut off residential growth for the remainder of the district.
“This industrial request was not consistent with the neighborhood land use designation that was in place,” said Nathan Foster, Principal Planner for the City of Tulsa. “We recommend denial of that land use change, and subsequently have recommended denial of changing the zoning as well.”
Foster noted that public interest in the case is exceptionally high, with the planning office receiving 51 emails regarding the proposal, 50 of which were in opposition.
For the families living across the street from the proposed site, the delay felt like a strategic move to exhaust the opposition.
“Asking for a continuance is a subversive bait-and-switch,” said resident Cheyenna Morgan. “Community members are taking time out of their work days… It’s just really disrespectful to community members.”
The TMAPC voted unanimously to push the hearing to April 1. Until then, the 375-acre stretch of land remains in limbo, serving as a quiet boundary between the existing suburbs and the looming industrial frontier.
The full hearing is now scheduled for April 1 at 1:00 p.m. at City Hall.
You can read the full staff report and see the maps of the proposed expansion here.
