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BESSEMER, Ala.They all came here for peace, and so far, the land has given it to them. For Marshall Killingsworth, the peace comes from the owls whose hoots echo across the valley as he sits in his favorite spot in his garden. For David Havron, its looking up at the stars at night as the moonlight glistens off the lake just outside his back door. For Mary Rosenboom, its the calls of the songbirds as the sun slowly sets over the hilly terrain. For Becky Morgan, its the view of the mountain from her reclinerthrough the long windows that line the sides of her home. But all these residents in this area of rural Jefferson County are afraidfearful that their peace may soon be disturbed. Town is moving closer to us, Jeff Lowe said last week. And were not happy about it. Marshall Killingsworth retired after decades of IT work. Hes among those opposed to a data center in their community. [Photo: Lee Hedgepeth/Inside Climate News] Killingsworth, Havron, Rosenboom, Morgan, and Lowe are just a few of the residents whose homes are adjacent to a 700-acre, wooded plot of land that soon may be transformed, through years of construction, into a 4.5-million-square-foot data processing center located just within the city limits of Bessemer, Alabama, a city of about 25,000 southwest of Birmingham. If built to planned capacity, the data center would be one of the largest in the United States and could become one of the largest single consumers of electricity in the state. Of nearly a dozen residents interviewed by Inside Climate News, none expressed support for the project as planned. Instead, all shared fear and frustration over their inability to obtain information about the $14.5 billion proposal from politicians charged with representing the public. Efforts by Inside Climate News to speak with public officials in Bessemer about the proposal, called Project Marvel, were met with silence. The mayor, his chief of staff and the citys attorney all signed a nondisclosure agreement with the developer, staffers said, and would not be able to answer questions about the project. Members of the Bessemer City Council, tasked with approving or rejecting the rezoning necessary for the proposed data center, have repeatedly refused to comment. I thought I answered your question, said Carla Jackson, a council member who represents the area of Bessemer where the data center is planned. And I was so sweet about it. Right now, while its under litigation, Im not going to talk about it. The Details on Data Centers In the last decade, technological evolution has quickened pace, with massive data centers now in demand for more intensive computational tasks like cryptocurrency mining and processing artificial intelligence requests. That digital demand, in turn, has made its way into the physical world as tech companies search for cheap land, electricity, water, and resources necessary for the development of large data processing centers like the one being proposed in Bessemer. A data center is like a city with computer servers as the buildings, requiring network cables, power sources, and cooling infrastructure, like roads, power lines, and sewer networks in a municipality. Data flows like traffic. Similar to the police and surveillance in a city, a data center also has security infrastructureelectric fences, anti-ram barriers, infrared cameras, alarms, lights, and sometimes even guard stations and other surveillance systems to protect against attacks. As of early 2025, the United States has more than 5,000 data centers, according to industry reports, compared to around 1,000 just five years earlier. And with that increased demand comes an inevitable, increased demand for resources. Project Marvel The proposed data center campus in Bessemer, if realized, would consist of 18 buildings, each larger than the average Walmart Supercenter, that would house massive server farms for data storage and processing. Located on about 700 acres of wooded land currently zoned for agricultural use, the proposed physical infrastructure would require the permanent clear-cutting of at least 100 acres of forest. The company behind the project is a newly created limited liability company, Logistics Land Investments, first formed in May 2023, according to records from the Delaware secretary of state. The companys registered agent is not a person, according to business records, but the Corporation Trust Company, also based in Delawarean entity that has been used by large tech companies like Google and Apple for corporate dealings in the past. [Image: Paul Horn/Inside Climate News] Despite its brief history, Logistics Land Investments has already found itself in at least one legal battle. Court records show that company has been sued by the First Baptist Church of Red Oak, Texas, a place of worship that was located on land the development company was interested in buying for another project. After the sale fell through, the church sued, arguing that the company had breached their agreement. The president of Bessemers City Council, Donna Thigpen, was the only public official interviewed who confirmed she had not yet signed an NDA. In fact, Thigpen said, shed been largely left in the dark on the proposed data center thus far. We have not met with the builders yet, she said. We know nothing about it. She referred further questions to the mayors office, though she noted hed signed an NDA. The mayors office did not respond to several requests for comment. The only information about the project made public so far has been in limited answers from the companys attorneys to residents concerns in planning and zoning meetings held earlier this year. Bessemer is located just southwest of Birmingham, Alabama. [Photo: Lee Hedgepeth/Inside Climate News] Those few answers provide only small, fragmented insights into what could be one of the largest capital outlays in recent state history. But even that information is probably more than is legally required to be given to residents, according to arguments made by an attorney for Bessemer in a recent court hearing. Theres no provision in the code of Alabama that authorizes the asking of questions, the furnishing of environmental reports or development plans, or anything of that nature, he told a Bessemer judge. You have a right to be heard as to whether you agree with that ordinance or not. Nothing more, nothing less. The city had landed in court after a group of residents filed suit, claiming that property owners werent given proper public notice ahead of a recent public hearing on the proposal. Because residents packed the meeting room, the city argued in court, there was no deficiency in public notice. Monica Agee, a Jefferson County Circuit Judge in the Birmingham division, issued a temporary restraining order on April 14 preventing the Bessemer City Council from voting on the proposed rezoning of the property from agricultural to industrial. After issuing the restraining order, Agee transferred the case to the countys Bessemer division, where the matter was scheduled for a hearing. Residents have organized against the data center proposal, holding community meetings and encouraging participation in zoning hearings. [Photo: Lee Hedgepeth/Inside Climate News] Agees temporary restraining order was wrong and illegal, attorney Shan Paden, representing the city, told Bessemer judge David Hobdy at an April 23 hearing. Hobdy scolded the lawyer for his comments about the judge. I take issue with the fact that youre saying that judge knew what she was doing was wrong, Hobdy said. Thats a circuit judge of Jefferson County, too, so I think she had appropriate authority to act at her discretion. Lawyers for both the residents and the city of Bessemer brought up the size of the project in making their respective arguments about how the judge should eventually rule. This is a $14 billion project, Paden said. To give you the scope of that, the entire value of all the real estate in the city of Bessmer in 2018 was $345 million dollars, Paden said in part. Public officials should be judging the merits of such a project, the lawyer argued, not a judge. Lawyers for the residents living near the proposed data center site, on the other hand, argued that the size of the project demands robust public notice and close adherence to relevant law. This is about protecting property owners rights to protect their land from money-grabbing AI developers who have devastated many, many communities across the country, the residents attorney, Reginald McDaniel, said. John Parker Yates, another attorney for the residents, reminded the judge that the identity of the developer and its potential client is still not known. This could be a Chinese data center, he said. And thats scarythat could be happening in our backyard and us not know. In the end, Judge Hobdy chose not to dismiss the lawsuit outright as lawyers for the city of Bessemer had asked him to do. Instead, he told both parties that he planned to hold over the case long enough for city officials to begin the public notice process and rezoning process again, in accordance with Alabama law. If and when that process is complete, the judge said, hed consider ordering a dismissal in the case. Hobdy set a status update hearing in the case for August 1. Despite the delay in the necessary rezoning achieved through the residents lawsuit, community members opposed to the project now have another, likely more difficult task ahead: to convince public officials to vote against moving the proposal forward. Marshalling the Troops Marshall Killingsworth walked in his garden on a recent afternoon, his daylilies blooming in the warm Alabama sun. Killingsworth, 80, retired after working for decades in IT at major companies, including Blue Cross Blue Shield and Drummond Coal. Even in retirement, though, hes busier now than ever. He spends much of his time outside, tending to an elaborate, well-kept yard overlooking a wooded valley where the data center is now proposed to be built. Soon, Ron and Becky Morgan, married nearly 28 years, came and sat with Killingsworth. Ron, an Army veteran, jumped into the conversation as soon as he arrived, talking intensely about potential noise, light pollution and the environmental impact of the necessary clear-cutting and construction. Becky placed her arm on Rons leg. We just got here, she said, laughing. Other people want to talk too. A painted bald eagle stands guard over Marshall Killingsworths garden in rural Jefferson County. [Photo: Lee Hedgepeth/Inside Climate News] You Cant Turn It Off Like AC In Alabama, almost all the new electric demand that the states largest energy company, Alabama Power, has projected is for data centers, said Daniel Tait, executive director of Energy Alabama, a nonprofit organization that advocates for clean energy in the state. Many data centers use alternative energy sources, including solar, wind, nuclear and hydrogen, to reduce carbon emissions and reduce their reliance on the electri grid, although investors in the Bessemer project have not outlined any such plans. Lawyers representing Logistics Land Investments did not respond to requests for comment. As demand for digital content grows, an arms race has escalated between tech giants to build digital warehouses and bring their services to market first. Data centers were initially smaller and demanded 50 to 200 megawatts of power to run. Driven by the development of AI, a new, second round of data centers uses five times more energy, averaging 2 to 3 gigawatts to sustain operations. They are considered high capacity because once the center is running, it doesnt stop. You cant turn it off like the AC, Tait said. If built to full capacity, the Bessemer data center campus is projected to consume around 1,200 megawatts of energy and could feasibly consume around 10.5 million megawatt hours per year. Thats more than 90 times the amount of energy used by all residences in Bessemer and more than 10 times the amount of energy used by all residences in Birmingham annually. An aerial view of the proposed Bessemer data center site [Photo: Lee Hedgepeth/Inside Climate News] Increased demand for energy, or at least the potential for it, is already driving Alabama Powers desire to double down on fossil fuel investments. The company, an effective monopoly, has asked the states Public Service Commission to approve its purchase of a gas-powered power plant in recent days, potentially exacerbating the states reliance on dirty energy that contributes to climate change. When a technology company proposes to a municipality to build a new digital storehouse, however, sometimes elevated demand load is overstated because every party is financially invested in overstating the need, Tait said. Even as the city moves forward with its plans, for example, there is no guarantee the data center will have customers once built. Jefferson Traywick serves as Jefferson Countys first ever economic development adviser. In an interview, he said that there are multiple potential customers engaging with investors about potential end use. Traywick said hed signed an NDA as well, so he couldnt say who those possible customers might be. I really dont even know, he said. Ideally, data center companies should pay for their own infrastructure, but in practice, this often doesnt happen, Tait said. The vast majority of these infrastructure projects benefit only the data center, not the broader customer base. Tait believes building these operations should not be on the backs of regular people to benefit the wealthiest corporations in America. These corporations, he said, should pay their fair share. If anything, they should pay more than their fair share. Brenda Small and her daughter, Brianna, live in a small trailer park just outside the boundaries of the proposed development. Last month, they were quick to express their opposition to the project. Small said her power bills are already approaching $500 some months. Thats ridiculous for one month, she said. Small worries her bills will soar even higher because of increased energy demand from the data center. Brianna, 11, pictured with her dog Grace, said shes opposed to the data center proposal because of its potential impact on the environment. [Photo: Lee Hedgepeth/Inside Climate News] In Georgia, tech companies and consumer advocates have negotiated and agreed that the data center operators cover their own infrastructure costs rather than passing those expenses entirely to consumers. Georgia has also been more forward-thinking about clean energy, Tait said. But Mississippis approach to cost allocation is a free-for-all. Last year, Mississippi passed a state law that declares anything Amazon needs to build is automatically in the public interest, with no Public Service Commission review. This approach is the most egregious example we see in terms of a cost allocation problem, Tait said. Alabama law contains tax carve-outs for capital projects, including a specific, 30-year tax abatement meant to attract large data centers. If approved by Bessemer officials, a tax abatement under the economic development law could amount to a tax cut of more than $500 million. Not a Drop to Drink? So-called hyperscale data centers like those used by Google, Meta, and other large tech companies can consume hundreds of gallons of water daily and millions annually. Smaller centers often use less than 100,000 gallons daily but can still consume a significant amount of a towns water supply if not properly managed. To cool heat generated by thousands of servers in one data center, a chilled water system is typical for a hyperscale data center. The central chiller cools the water, circulates it through heat-absorbing coils, and dissipates the heat into the air through a cooling tower. The water then recirculates. In smaller centers, water can be piped to nearby wastewater facilities. Lawyers for Logistic Land Investments have said in documents that the proposed Bessemer facilitys end user may choose to rely on a so-called closed loop cooling system meant to reduce water usage and waste, but its unclear exactly how that system will workwhat the water demand will be and where wastewater would be discharged. Despite the rapid construction of new data centers driven by the demand for AI, cryptocurrency mining, and cloud computing, Alabama lacks a comprehensive water plan. Under state law, if you own land next to a river or stream in Alabama, you can use the water without a permit. Businesses using more than 100,000 gallons of water daily are required to file a certificate and declare the water usage as beneficial, but the reporting is largely self-regulated without meaningful oversight, and penalties are nonexistent for noncompliance, according to CindyLowry, executive director of Alabama Rivers Alliance. Most states in the east have a regulated water withdrawal system, she said. Alabama does not. We have virtually nothing, said Lowry. If different sources pull from one river, like the Black Warrior River, and everyone is filling out a certificate, Theres nobody looking to say: How much can the system handle? How many straws are in the system? Lowry said. By consuming large amounts of water, a data center, like the one proposed in western Jefferson County, has the potential to become the largest water consumer in the state. Already, 80% of water withdrawals in the state are for cooling coal, gas, and nuclear plants, Lowry added. Often, utilities may not have initially planned for such massive water demands. With their high water consumption for cooling systems, data centers pose several significant water challenges for Alabama. A data center can strain local water utilities capacity, increase water bills for existing customers, disrupt the natural flow of rivers, reduce the water available for downstream users, and potentially destroy local ecosystems. Dynamics like these worry Ron and Becky Morgan. The couple is among the few residents in the area on well water, Becky explained, putting them at risk of becoming victims of groundwater contaminationwater used to cool data centers is mixed with chemical coolantsor more general water scarcity. Were on the front lines when it comes to water, she said. Jeff Lowe, a retired firefighter, said he worries about the impact the facility will have on the ability of first responders to adequately address fires in the area. They say Warrior River is going to supply it, Lowe said of the local water utility. But I dont know if they can. They cant even keep the fire hydrants around here going. Lowe said he also wonders about the additional fire risk posed by the data center itself, potentially replete with electronic equipment and lithium batteries, in a community with limited resources to respond to large, industrial fires. I just dont know if they have the resources to deal with something like that before it gets out of hand, he said. The Loss of the Land On the whole, residents fear perpetual daylight will replace starlight and the 24-hour mechanical whir of machinery will be their surround sound, drowning out the birdsong. They foresee the banks of Little Blue Creek and other wetlands being deforested, the lakes flooded with potentially toxic runoff laced with coolants, and wildlife driven from their habitat. David Havron, president of the Rock Mountain Lakes Landowners Association, is one of the residents who filed suit against the city, resulting in the restraining order that delayed the city councils vote to move the project forward. David Havron, a local CPA, heads the Rock Mountain Lake Landowners Association. [Photo: Lee Hedgepeth/Inside Climate News] He worries that the nighttime view from his dock, just a stones throw from his back door, will soon be ruined in favor of a project that he believes will provide little benefit to his neighborhood or those living in it. Its going to look like a sunset, he said of the light pollution. A constant haze in the sky. Residents have expressed concern about the impact of years of construction on nearby wildlife. [Photo: Lee Hedgepeth/Inside Climate News] With less vegetation to absorb rainwater because of the clear-cutting necessary to complete the project, Havron said residents are worried flooding could become worse in the area, with runoff potentially filling the lakes around which many of the residents have built their homes and lives. Then, theres the risk to wildlife. A view of one of the many lakes in the Rock Mountain Lakes neighborhood [Photo: Lee Hedgepeth/Inside Climate News] Itll all be gone, Havron said. Itll run off. Theres a set of bald eagles. Theres deer and coyotes, racoons and turkeys and everything else here. Itll all be gone. . . . Its going to have to be cut. Were Going to Fight Not long after Ron and Becky Morgan had arrived at Marshall Killingsworths garden gathering, Mary Rosenboom came and sat down among the daylilies, completing the circle of neighbors brought together by the fight to save their community from an unwanted development. A sales professional, Rosenboom said shed never delved into political or environmental issues until the data center came knocking at the communitys door. Once she began to look into the potential impacts, she quickly realized this was a fight she was willing to join and, if necessary, help lead. Now, shes become an accidental activist. It was absolutely an accident, but here I am, she said. From left: Ron Morgan, Becky Morgan, and Mary Rosenboom gather to discuss Project Marvel. [Photo: Lee Hedgepeth/Inside Climate News] Sitting in front of her was a brightly colored binder, filled with research on data centers, city governance, and what the impact could be in her community. Its a hard fight to win, Rosenboom said, when theres so little information being provided about the specifics of the project. The non-disclosure agreements, the residents said, was one of their top concerns. When youre dealing with public funds and public ordinances, there should be no NDA, Ron Morgan said. Even if public officials are unwilling to talk about the possible impacts of the project, the residents around the site say theyre ready for a war. Securing the restraining order and delaying the process was a battle won, they said, but the fight is still well underway. Becky Morgan, also a plaintiff in the suit against the city, said previous public hearings have been largely a formality, with officials doing little to meaningfully engage with citizens concerns. Its just a farce, she said. And when it came time for officials to ask questions of the developer, there was little desire on the part of public officials to push the data center representatives for more substantive information. They already had their marching orders, her husband, Ron, said. And now we have ours. The next stage of the fight is already underway. Residents living near the site of a proposed data center in Alabama gather to hear updates from their lawyers. [Photo: Lee Hedgepeth/Inside Climate News] The last week of April, more than 100 residents gathered inside Rock Mountain Baptist Church to hear from lawyers McDaniel and Yates about what may come next. The pair characterized securing a delay in the rezoning process as a win but warned residents that a protracted legal fight could drag on for years and cost the community upwards of six figures. Attorneys John Parker Yates and Reginald McDaniel speak with residents about what comes next in their fight against a proposed data center. [Photos: Lee Hedgepeth/Inside Climate News] Outside the legal realm, the lawyers said, residents should do all they can to press local political leaders to oppose the project and provide as much information about the proposal as possible before and during newly scheduled planning and zoning commission and city council meetings in the coming weeks. No matter what, the lawyers told the crowd, fighting a municipality with practically unlimited resources over a multibillion-dollar project will be an uphill battle. It was a reality many of the residents were already coming to terms with. They were ready for the fight. By Lee Hedgepeth and Lanier Isom, Inside Climate News This article originally appeared on Inside Climate News. It is republished with permission. Sign up for its newsletter here.
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Nearly two years after catastrophic wildfires destroyed more than 2,000 houses and apartment buildings in Lahaina, Hawaii, only 10 homes have been rebuilt. Hundreds of others are under construction, but the process of rebuilding is painfully slow. One temporary neighborhood is an exception: called Ka Lai Ola, its filled with modular, factory-built houses and is now home to more than 600 people. Hundreds of additional modular homes on the site will soon be ready for occupancy. And it might be a model for other communities that are trying to recover from disastersthough it also raises questions about the cost of building temporary housing. The timeline was unlike anything that weve ever experienced, says Kimo Carvalho, executive director of HomeAid Hawaii, the nonprofit leading the development of the project in partnership with the state of Hawaii. The team secured land in February 2024 and broke ground at the beginning of May. One hundred days later, the first families started moving in. Lahaina, August 10, 2023 [Photo: Patrick T. Fallon/AFP/Getty Images] Vetting 130 modular housing companies Before the fires in Maui, the nonprofit was focused on building housing for the most vulnerable Hawaii residents. (HomeAid Hawaii is the local chapter of a national group created by the building industry to help tackle the affordable housing crisis.) In August 2023, after the wildfires, the nonprofit started working with the state on the disaster response. Immediately after the fires, the state was inundated with calls from modular housing companies; it realized that factory-built modular housing would likely be an important tool in the recovery. So while the nonprofit scoured the area for a place to build temporary housing, the group simultaneously started vetting more than 130 companies that make modular homes. Everyone said, I can absolutely get you 400 homes within three months, Carvalho says. And as a realist, I was able to break that down and ask about the specifics that got us to a true understanding of their timelines, production schedules, transportation, what the work would be looking like on site, and basically coming up with a real budget. They realized that a single company wouldnt be able to supply the 450 homes that they wanted for the project. So the team made a short list of finalists, visiting their factories in person to do due diligence, and ultimately choosing five providers. [Photo: HomeAid Hawaii] Finding a site to build At the same time, they were racing to find land. The 57-acre site they ultimately chose had challenges, including the fact that it was covered in volcanic rock. Preparing the land for construction meant an expensive process of using dynamite to blast through enough rock to install sewer, water, and electrical lines. The land sits on a slope, and engineering the right foundations for the locations was another challenge to solve. The site also has a complex history. The land originally belonged to Hawaiian royalty; it was ceded to the U.S. government when the monarchy was overthrown in 1893. When Hawaii became a state in 1959, the parcel was part of a larger collection of land that went to the state government, with the intent that it would be used to help native Hawaiians. Now, the state plans to use the site for emergency housing only for five years, as it makes plans to build permanent housing there for Hawaii residents. Its not yet clear what will happen to the modular homes when the five years are up. But the land was relatively close to some employment, a critical factor for fire survivors who were struggling with transportation. So the team moved forward. While the lease for the land was being finalized, the modular providers were getting ready to begin shipping units as soon as possible. [Photo: HomeAid Hawaii] An accelerated timeline Permitting happened quickly, as the government used its emergency declaration to speed up the process. We brought the stakeholders together in one room, so it wasnt five different agencies looking at a permit set that would otherwise take eight months, says Carvalho. We got our grading permit in two weeks. I think the project has demonstrated not only what modular manufacturing can do, but also what government can do to truly just get housing built. Construction also happened quickly. Most of the work on the modular homes happened in factories, with construction crews handling other steps like putting in foundations, steps, and decks. I dont think we would have been able to meet our timeline had modular not been an option, he says. The first families moved into the homes in August 2024, a year after the fire. The homes, which range in size from studios to small three-bedroom houses, are limited to survivors who werent eligible for help from the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), which has also built some modular housing in Lahaina. The majority of residents are renters. Others are homeowners with specific challenges. For example, one couple didnt qualify for FEMA aid because they had insurance cverage, but their insurance settlement doesnt actually cover the cost of rebuilding their home. Rent at Ka Lai Ola is free until August, and then theyll pay below market rate, helping them save up to cover the cost of rebuilding. [Photo: HomeAid Hawaii] A lifelife for residents For the residents whove been able to move in, the site has been a lifeline. You see a sigh of relief when they receive keys, and know that they dont have to jump around from hotel to hotel for the next four years, says Cesar Martinez, the director at Ka Lai Ola. Martinez and his family also lost their own rental home in the fire. Like others, they didnt get any official warning the day of the catastrophe. Gale-force winds had taken out power and cell service. Martinez and his girlfriend and children fled when smoke filled the air and they started hearing explosions in the neighborhood. Cesar Martinez and Patricia Nebrida [Photo: HomeAid Hawaii] They were able to safely escape by driving up a dirt road into the hills and spending the night at a hotel where Martinez and his girlfriend had worked in the past. But when they returned a couple of days later, everything was gone. We drove to the property where we lived and confirmed with our own eyes that nothing was there, he says. The house theyd rented had burned down. The place where Martinez worked was gone. His childrens school, which had been scheduled to start a new school year the day after the fire happened, was also gone. Like thousands of other Lahaina residents, they stayed temporarily in hotels. But the shortage of housing, and the extreme cost of the little housing that was left, meant that they considered leaving Hawaii. When they were able to move to Ka Lai Ola, they knew that they would have a place to live until 2029, and that was incredibly important for their mental health. Theres a lot of uncertainty, he says. A lot of people who didnt have much, now have even less.” Meeting their new neighbors also helped. The modular homes are arranged in pods of 14 or 16 units. “We placed units strategically in ways where there would be intentional community connections,” says Carvalho. The community also has access to financial literacy classes, mental health counseling, a mobile food bank, and a mobile vet clinic that offers free care for pets. The site itself, with a view of the ocean, is peaceful. The name means “The Place of Peaceful Recovery” in Hawaiian. A steep cost It’s undeniable that the development happened quicklyand for that reason, aspects of the approach could be useful for other areas. Changing permitting rules was key, and so was the use of modular homes. Carvalho has been meeting with groups from California that are currently working on plans to rebuild areas that burned in January around Los Angeles. He has offered, he says, to share HomeAid’s analysis of all of the modular housing companies. But the homes come at a steep cost: The project costs $185 million, or more than $400,000 per home. (The nonprofit says that’s still $52 million less than the state would have spent with typical construction; the project saved $14 million because of donated materials and labor. The Hawaii Community Foundation also contributed $40 million from funds collected from global donors.) Most of the cost went to building underlying infrastructure, from sewer and water connections to grading the land, since it was an undeveloped area; the base cost of each home was only around $122,000. The same infrastructure can later be used to support permanent housing for Hawaii residents, and the modular housing itself can likely be used much longer than the current five-year plan. Still, critics argue that costs were higher than necessary because the developer didn’t get bids from multiple contractors in order to speed up construction. Critics are also concerned that HomeAid hasn’t been transparent about specific costs; the nonprofit acknowledges that it’s behind in providing receipts. And while the project has undeniably helped its residents, 12,000 people were displaced by the fires; one development can’t help everyone. The cost is also a reminder that as climate change makes disasters more common, communities also need to invest more in preventionrepeatedly rebuilding is financially unsustainable. In L.A., for example, the fires this year were 35% more likely because of climate change. The same extreme conditions will happen again, and neighborhoods need to be better designed with that in mind. At a national level, the Trump administration recently shut down a program that helped communities become more resilient in order to limit damage in disasters. But some cities are still trying to do more. In Berkeley, California, for example, homeowners in neighborhoods that are at the highest risk from fire will now be required to clear “defensible space” around their homes so fires can’t spread as easily.
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E-Commerce
In this episode of FC Explains, hosted by Josh Christensen, we break down why the 2024 WNBA Draft is being hailed as the moment that changed everything for women’s sports. From record-breaking viewership and unprecedented media attention to historic endorsement deals and social media buzz, this draft marked a new era for female athletes and the business of sports.
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