Rumors of data centers coming to Baldwin County have been circulating on Facebook for the last year or so.
Believing everything you read on Facebook is a terrible idea, however. To date, none of the rumors had been substantiated.
Now, though, there’s a rumor worth paying attention to, one that first began surfacing several months ago. The Milledgeville City Council last week approved a zoning change to the old EWAC property, located on the Vinson Highway and sandwiched between Carl Vinson Road and the Selma Irwin Nature Preserve. The 43,839-square-foot building was built in 1975 as part of the Central State Hospital campus.
Smisson Land Development, LLC purchased the property in 2021 from the Central State Hospital Local Redevelopment Authority for $200,000. The Smisson Group, based in Macon, is one of the larger commercial real estate owners in this part of Georgia. The company recently opened a biodiesel plant near Dublin.
Matthew Roessing, an attorney representing the Smisson Group, told the City Council that “Dr. Smisson’s intention is to develop this and then either lease or sell it to a person that would use it for manufacturing and warehousing.”
The Baldwin Bulletin followed up later in the week, emailing Roessing and asking the following question: Is a data center (a place with high-performance computer servers) one of the future options that’s been discussed for the old EWAC property?
Replied Roessing, via email: “I don’t think the property owner is set on any particular use. It was recently rezoned so it could be marketed for a variety of industrial uses, including warehousing and manufacturing. The building is in great shape with easy truck access.”
A “small” data center, for whatever it’s worth, generally is between 5,00020,000 square feet, while a “medium-sized” data center is between 20,000100,000 square feet.