- Michigan’s largest data center project will get a 12-year, 50% tax abatement — but not for the $43 billion it’s valued at today
- Saline Township approved the tax cut based on a $4.8 billion project, which was originally outlined
- The township was bound by a court order after the development sued, saying officials had been trying to prevent it
A Washtenaw County community on Tuesday OK’d a controversial tax break for a giant data center project valued today at $43 billion, but cut the dollar value of the subsidy nine-fold from the developer’s latest request.
A tax break that would have been worth $147 million a year now appears to be worth less than $20 million a year.
Saline Township had been bound by a court order to approve a 12-year, 50% tax break for “The Barn,” a 250-acre project developed by The Related Cos. for Oracle and its customer, OpenAI.
But the township said the deal, which followed a lawsuit by Related, had been struck when the project was valued at $4.8 billion — and that’s the amount the township voted to approve as the basis for the tax break.
Residents spoke against the project for nearly two hours, just as they had a week earlier when the township decided to delay the vote until Tuesday.
“To deny this and stop the development would be a violation,” Township Supervisor Tom Hammond said ahead of the comments.
At the same time, he said, the township had a lot of protections in the court order to let the project proceed. The compromise that benefitted the township, the board determined, was to approve the original ask.
The board also added a “clawback” provision allowing the township to collect the taxes the developer didn’t have to pay if the project isn’t completed or doesn’t operate for the full 12 years of the abatement.
At The Barn’s full $43 billion valuation, it would generate about $294 million in taxes per year. With a 50% tax break, it would have paid an average of $147 million per year for the 12-year period.
Township documents obtained by Bridge showed that $105 million of that would have gone to state and local education, with another $27 million bound for Washtenaw County.
The township did not offer estimates for the tax break difference.
Kathleen Corless, a Related spokesperson, said the company is “evaluating the validity of the Board’s actions.”
Related also is looking at the township’s “legal obligations under the consent judgement, which we view as inconsistent with what occurred. “
The request for the tax break focused the statewide data center debate on local subsidies requested by some of the largest companies in the US.
A 2025 law championed by Gov. Gretchen Whitmer already allows projects to be exempt from state and local use taxes. Now, host communities statewide face additional requests for property tax cuts worth billions of dollars.
