(Alan Wooten, The Center Square) — Halting development of data centers in North Carolina’s second-largest city is up for discussion when the Raleigh City Council meets in October.

In closed session Tuesday away from public transparency, elected city leaders directed legal counsel to draft a proposal. Mayor Janet Cowell held a press conference Wednesday with explanation.

“As soon as you write a rule and you adopt an ordinance, that could be out of date within a short period of time,” Cowell said. “So, all of that I think just said, ‘OK, why don’t we put a pause on this?’

“And I will also say, as an elected official, it’s hard to even have a conversation about this because there’s so much emotion and … of course, we’re also getting into election season, so you’ve seen this nationally, but I think we all felt like getting a pause gives us a chance to actually have a conversation, do the work, and maybe lower the temperature.”

Charlotte, Greensboro, Durham and Fayetteville already have hit the pause button. Raleigh’s plan would be for six months.

Charlotte’s estimated population is 944,742, Raleigh at 500,639. Greensboro and Durham are each more than 300,000 and third and fourth largest, respectively. Fayetteville is sixth.

A 100,000-square-foot proposal on 13 acres in southeastern Raleigh, about one-third of a mile from Jones Sausage Road and Rock Quarry Road, is in limbo. Colorado-based RadiusDC remains committed to the project, according to published reports, though the land is owned and managed by Beacon Partners.

The latter has withdrawn an annexation petition for the buildout valued at $180 million.

The council meets Oct. 6. An agenda is not finalized; a 7 p.m. public hearing could be scheduled.

In some form or fashion since September 2025, published reports say moratoriums on data centers of one year or more are in the counties of Gates, Northampton, Harnett, Durham, Orange, Chatham, Rowan, Davie, Clay, Swain and on the Qualla Boundary of the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians. More than a dozen cities in that time have enacted anywhere from 60-day to one-year prohibitions: Boiling Spring Lakes, Spring Hope, Wendell, Holly Springs, Apex, Fayetteville, Durham, Hillsborough, Charlotte, Kings Mountain, Boone, Asheville, Woodfin, Brevard, Canton, Clyde and Franklin.

For context, the state has 100 counties and just over 1,100 municipal government units.

According to Data Center Maps, the state had 90 data centers on Jan. 1, 2025. Three were added last year, four thus far this year.