Atlanta needs citywide moratorium on data centers

In response to “Data center pitch highlights divide in changing SW Atlanta neighborhoods,” I’m happy to see the Neighborhood Planning Unit V voted against endorsing proposed legislation to make an exception for a data center to be built near the West End MARTA station.

As a West End resident, I want to see development in my neighborhood that will bring affordable housing and small businesses, not major industrial facilities like data centers.

I am very concerned about the rapid buildout of data centers happening across Georgia. Data centers are energy and water hogs that will lead to higher electricity rates for all of us and further strain our water resources.

The Atlanta City Council made the right decision in 2024 when it banned data centers within a half mile of major transit stations. Council members will soon vote on whether to grant an exception for this proposed West End data center. They should vote no and instead pass a citywide moratorium on all new data centers.

MICHELLE ALLEN, ATLANTA

Piedmont Park shooting is a stain on the city

Earlier this month, a precious girl was senselessly killed and another child seriously injured at Piedmont Park, which is the iconic gathering place for Atlantans. So many concerts and festivals take place there.

This criminal activity is a terrible stain on the city of Atlanta, the “City Too Busy to Hate,” so they say.

How did these criminals get their guns? What were they doing roaming the green fields of the park at all hours of the night?

How does the city of Atlanta expect metro residents to come to the city when such dangers exist?

SALPI ADROUNY, JOHNS CREEK

Pope speaks with moral authority

Thanks, Pope Leo XIV, for speaking out with moral authority about the morality of this war.

Thanks for calling out a man who speaks on Easter in horrid profanities and then posts a picture of himself in holy garbs, in a scene depicting himself as Jesus. He needs to call out Catholics and non-Catholics, horrified by broken morality.

This insults God. A man who led attacks on two countries in two months and promises Cuba and Greenland next? Then Canada? What’s wrong with him?

I’m not a Catholic, and I am a Republican. Protestants, when will we speak up with moral leadership?

If Republican congressional representatives don’t join me, I’m voting them out.

DAN SMITH, ALPHARETTA

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Members of NPU-V vote to recommend against a City of Atlanta change that would allow a data center to be built in Adair Park during a long and contentious meeting Monday, April 13, 2026. (Ben Gray for the AJC)

Credit: (Ben Gray for the AJC)

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With roughly a month to go until primary day in Georgia, candidates in some of the state's most competitive congressional races have begun to lap the field in fundraising. (Philip Robibero | Source: Getty, Pexels, AJC)

Credit: Photo Illustration: Philip Robibero | Source: Getty, Pexels, AJC