A Cheyenne resident files suit seeking to overturn a 3,500-acre land annexation that enabled Microsoft to proceed with its data center project in Wyoming.
Heather Madrid Donis, a Laramie County homeowner, has escalated her opposition to Microsoft's planned 2.7-gigawatt Highlands data center campus to court, filing two petitions in Laramie County District Court that accuse city officials of illegally approving the 3,500-acre annexation. The petitions claim the wrong landowner is listed on annexation paperwork and that the city council held an unannounced vote on a petition to overturn the approval. The Cheyenne City Council approved the annexation of roughly 3,460 acres in July, expanding the city's area by 20 percent.
Donis had spent months gathering petition signatures for a referendum to put the annexation on the ballot. Under Wyoming law, a referendum qualifies if it is signed by 10 percent of registered city voters—roughly 2,700 in Cheyenne—within 20 days of the ordinance's publication. Petitioners collected more than 3,000 signatures before the deadline, but the council never placed the measure on its agenda.
Instead, Donis alleges, the council entered an improper executive session on August 10, closing the door to public input. When council members emerged, they voted 8-1 to authorize the city attorney to seek a court ruling on whether an annexation can be challenged through a referendum or whether state law limits residents to district court appeals. Donis filed her first petition arguing that this vote—on an item not listed on the public agenda—violated Wyoming's Open Meetings Act. If a judge rules in her favor, the council's request for a court ruling on the referendum would be undone, though the referendum would not automatically go to voters.
Her second petition, filed September 3, seeks to void the July 13 annexation itself. Donis acknowledges the legal hurdles: "I don't have legal standing is the argument I think they'd make, and that might be fair," she said. "I guess the injured party would probably be the property owners, not me." Yet she argues the implications extend beyond individual property owners. "I feel like the entire city has legal standing to challenge," she said, citing concerns about emergency services being stretched thin.
Brian Childers, who owns land about four miles from the Microsoft annexation, expressed similar frustrations. "I live in the county, so I don't have any say at the city council meetings," he said. "But from what I've seen and heard, those city council members don't give a rat's ass what the people want." Childers reported already experiencing impacts from the existing Microsoft data center: the disappearance of bird populations and a persistent low-frequency noise. He fears the second facility will compound these problems and argued the city should have stood up for residents before construction began.
Cheyenne Mayor Patrick Collins defended the August 10 executive session, saying it was on the council's agenda and intended to clarify conflicting statutes regarding annexation appeals. "Our governing body wants to understand what's the right way for somebody to object," Collins said. "That was the thing we're trying to clear up." He noted the council is continuing to count referendum signatures—reportedly about 60 percent complete—and processing the annexation in parallel. Collins also disputed claims that the council doesn't listen, pointing to hours of testimony heard during the annexation debate and new mitigation requirements including conservation easements, landscaped buffers, and replacement wells negotiated with neighbors.
Council member Pete Laybourn acknowledged room for improvement in how the council communicates with the public. "This entire data center gold rush is moving so fast," he said. "It's not going to slow down. We can't declare a moratorium, but we sure could understand it and communicate it better to people who are interested." While the council does hear resident testimony, Laybourn said the issue is that it struggles to answer specific concerns about noise levels, air quality, and infrastructure gaps in South Cheyenne. He is working on a joint powers board and unified planning commission to streamline communication and accelerate the city's ability to address residents' concerns about rapid data center expansion.