“Ultimately if you ask most people who live, work, or go to school in downtown Oakland they want affordable housing, daycare, or grocery store that benefits the community…but we are being presented with this false choice: empty store fronts or a data center. And we refuse to accept that.”

“There has been pushback against data centers in other Bay Area cities in recent months. In March, the Oakley City Council approved a new industrial logistics hub after the developer agreed to drop plans to include data centers. In Pittsburg, some residents have voiced concerns about a planned data center at a former golf course. A massive 300,000-square-foot data center being built in Hayward has also faced pushback from community members.”

“The Party for Socialism and Liberation, which has been active in organizing against projects in Oakley and Pittsburg, is pushing for a similar ban in Oakland.” 

“The group started a petition this week to call on the city council to ban all data centers in the city. Aditi Varshneya, an organizer with PSL who lives and works in Oakland, said the more than 3,500 signatures they’ve gathered show that residents don’t want a data center at all.” 

The Party for Socialism and Liberation has emerged as one of the project’s primary opponents, starting an online petition over concerns AI data centers “destroy jobs and the environment,”

“We think that people should decide what’s in our communities, not these companies run by the ultra-rich,” said Aditi Varshneya, an organizer with the Party for Socialism and Liberation.