Data centers in Stark County, Ohio: 2 projects mapped

Imagery: Esri, Maxar

Stark County already hosts one large computing load, and it is a bitcoin mine. Bitdeer Technologies, a Singapore-based crypto miner that has been moving into AI computing, is developing a 221 megawatt mining site in Massillon, where a fire damaged two buildings in November 2025, Data Center Dynamics reported. The company says 45 of its Massillon workers live within five miles of the site. What has divided the county in 2026 is a more conventional project: Panattoni Development Company's plan for a 240 megawatt data center on more than 100 acres at Faircrest Street SW and Kropf Avenue in Perry Township.

Perry Township trustees voted 2-1 on March 24 to give the Faircrest site a 30-year property tax abatement, despite opposition from numerous residents, and Canton City Council approved it on May 18 under the joint economic development district it shares with Perry. The county then gave the project the approval it needed to proceed, and WHBC reported that even with the abatement it is expected to become the county's single biggest taxpayer. At an open house at Perry High School in April, Panattoni's data center chief, Adam Kramer, promised "the quietest industrial neighbor in that whole area" and pointed to Fairfax County, Virginia, as a place where data centers lowered residents' taxes. He did not say how many permanent jobs the site will support. "There's water issues ... noise issues, there's the secrecy that went around about it being put in," said Gina Risher, who lives about a mile away. Canton resident Brenda Parsons listed inhalable particles, water use, wastewater, noise and light. Both have signed petitions for a proposed statewide constitutional amendment to ban data centers larger than 25 megawatts.

Other local governments have moved the other way. Plain Township trustees approved a 12-month moratorium on data centers on March 24, and Canton Township a one-year moratorium in April. Massillon passed a 180-day moratorium, then cut it to a 60-day stay on the grounds that the zoning code should not take six months to fix. The rules its council began considering in May would define data centers under 100,000 square feet as light industrial and larger ones as heavy industrial, set setbacks from homes, and require the electric, water and wastewater utilities to certify they can serve a site before the city signs off. "Utility companies (and the city engineer for wastewater) will need to certify they can supply (services) to a data center before city approval," said development director Ted Herncane. A data center developer has also looked at the city's Massillon Technology and Energy Park, the former Republic Steel site. The Ohio Capital Journal reported in September that Massillon has since lifted its moratorium after adopting data center zoning.

Every project above is drawn from public records, filings and local reporting. Each row links to what it is based on. Statuses change, so check the source date before you rely on one. Found something wrong? Write to [email protected] and it gets fixed.