Pennhurst Data Center, East Vincent Township, Pennsylvania

Pennhurst Holdings LLC wanted to build a 1.9 million square foot data center on the grounds of the former Pennhurst State School and Hospital in East Vincent Township, Chester County, Pennsylvania, now a Halloween attraction. In November 2025 the township supervisors put forward an ordinance to set rules for it: height and setback requirements and limits on various kinds of pollution, with a vote scheduled for December 17, 2025.

Residents did not want rules; they wanted a refusal. Dina Hitchcock said: "In my opinion, creating this ordinance could be viewed as a red carpet invitation to a data center," and: "I'd rather this just be turned down outright." She was not against them everywhere. "I do understand there is a need for them," Hitchcock said. "I am just saying this is not the appropriate place." Joanna Binelli said: "I don't believe, strongly, that there's anything that you can put in the ordinance that will prevent these things from happening." State Senator Katie Muth said: "People here deserve better. They live here. They deserve to live in peace and quiet, and also not to have to subsidize this through utility bills."

John Quigley, of the University of Pennsylvania's Kleinman Center, put the water question where it matters locally: "Whether it's being drawn from streams, rivers, or whether it's, especially if it's from groundwater, there are over one million Pennsylvanians that get their water from wells."

On December 17, 2025 the supervisors shelved the ordinance, as residents had asked, and sent the application to a conditional use hearing instead. The township planning commission recommended against the plan, citing a lack of detail, technical deficiencies and conflicts with the zoning ordinance.

On May 21, 2026, at the second hearing, the three supervisors unanimously rejected it as failing to meet the zoning standards, to cheers from more than 100 people; residents of the Southeastern Veterans' Center a few hundred feet away had opposed it. The developer's spokesman said it would appeal: "We plan to appeal the decision and we look forward to presenting the merits of the project in a court of law." Its attorney, Matt McHugh, said the appeal would go to the Chester County Court of Common Pleas, arguing the township is legally obliged to allow for data centers.