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Date: Monday, October 26, 2026 Time: 1:00 PM Place: Board Chambers, 4th Floor Courthouse

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Meeting ID: 846 2424 2719 Passcode: 306974

AGENDA Board members reserve the right to move items from the order listed on the agenda.

In compliance with Iowa Code Section 21.4, Board of Supervisors meeting agendas are posted on the bulletin board outside the Board Chambers and the County website a minimum of 24 hours prior to the scheduled meeting. After such time, the posted agenda will not change; however, agenda packet attachments may be modified or added until the start of the meeting.

If you require the assistance of auxiliary aids or services to participate in this meeting because of a disability, immediately call

the County Auditor's Office at 563-589-4499 or the County Personnel Office at 563-589-4445. If you are hearing impaired, call Relay Iowa TTY at 1-800-735-2942.

Dubuque County Board of Supervisors

Wayne Kenniker Wayne.Kenniker@dubuquecountyiowa.gov

Ann McDonough Ann.Mcdonough@dubuquecountyiowa.gov

Harley Pothoff Harley.Pothoff@dubuquecountyiowa.gov

Initially presented and discussed at Board of Supervisors meeting, June 15, 2026, and updated and approved by the Board, July 6, 2026.

This moratorium and its resulting recommendations shall apply only to proposed large-scale industrial and/or hyperscale data center developments within the unincorporated areas of the County, including associated or supporting infrastructure. Covered projects include developments requiring significant land use, major electrical infrastructure, substantial water consumption, utility expansion, or campus-style construction.

During the one-year moratorium period, the Board of Supervisors, with support from County staff, shall complete the following actions prior to consideration of any data center application, rezoning request, permit approval, or related infrastructure approval. Responsibility for each action shall be assigned to the appropriate County department or staff member.

The County shall draft and publicly review a comprehensive Data Center Ordinance addressing but not limited to:

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The County shall complete the following and other evaluations with appropriate expert and staff review:

The County shall conduct:

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All meetings shall be publicly noticed, recorded, and archived.

During the moratorium, neither Dubuque County nor any County department, board, commission, official, employee, or agent shall accept, process, review, approve, issue, or otherwise authorize any discretionary approval for a covered Data Center project or supporting infrastructure.

The Board of Supervisors shall hold weekly public work sessions throughout the moratorium focused on, but not limited to:

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Be recorded and publicly accessible

County staff and/or designated committees shall provide monthly public progress reports identifying:

The ordinance development process shall remain open and transparent through:

Public access to draft ordinance language

Public review opportunities

Open discussion of revisions and recommendations

At the conclusion of each meeting:

Progress shall be publicly tracked

A final public findings report will be produced by County staff summarizing the planning process, technical analyses, public input received, recommendations considered, and the rationale supporting the adopted ordinance and any related policy decisions.

The moratorium process shall remain focused on ordinance development, completion of required studies, public engagement, and establishment of enforceable protections prior to consideration of any data center proposal.

The Board may consider the termination of the moratorium in accordance with the Moratorium Resolution adopted by the Board on July 6, 2026.

The Board may extend the moratorium in accordance with its moratorium resolution.

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Adopted by the Dubuque County Board of Supervisors this 6th day of July, 2026.

Harley V. Pothoff Harley V. Pothoff (Jul 7, 2026 16:51:23 CDT)

Harley V. Pothoff, Chair Dubuque County Board of Supervisors

ATTEST:

Keith Lucy (Jul 7, 2026 15:17:37 CDT)

Keith Lucy, Dubuque County Auditor

A CLEAR PROCESS. PROTECTING LAND. SERVING PEOPLE. PLANNING FOR THE FUTURE.

Foundation Utility

Equipment

Foundation Removal

Soil

Removal Removal Removal Restoration

Removal

Agricultural

Agricultural

Restoration

AVOIDANCE – Can impacts be avoided?

MINIMIZATION – Can remaining impacts be reduced?

MITIGATION – Can unavoidable impacts be offset?

MONITORING – Will compliance be verified over time?

ENFORCEMENT – Are meaningful remedies available?

1 Comprehensive Plan Consistent with adopted county plans.

2 Site Suitability Outside exclusion areas or meets strict exceptions.

3 Infrastructure Capacity exists or upgrades are fully funded by developers.

4 Environmental Protection Independent studies demonstrate compliance.

5 Fiscal Neutrality Public costs fully covered and long-term benefits demonstrated.

6 Community Compatibility Noise, lighting, traffic, visual impacts meet standards.

7 Financial Assurance Bonds and guarantees in place before construction.

8 Public Interest Board finds project advances public health, safety, and welfare.

10100000000

U

PROTECT LAND. PROTECT RESOURCES. PROTECT OUR FUTURE.

JOSEPH L. KENNEDY, Sheriff

DAVID T. RINIKER, Chief Deputy

September 28, 2026

To: Dubuque County Board of Supervisors, Chairperson Harley Pothoff

From: Sheriff Joe Kennedy

Re: Datacenter safety concerns

Chairperson Pothoff,

During a Board of Supervisors meeting a few weeks ago, there was discussion and request for information regarding law enforcement-related issues that have occurred because of datacenters. Following that discussion, I reached out to several Sheriff's and Chiefs of Police in areas that either have completed datacenters within their service areas or have datacenters currently in the construction process, with the purpose of ascertaining the issues they have experienced regarding these structures.

The results showed outside of the increased traffic and construction-related complaints during the construction phase of these projects, these law enforcement professionals reported no other concerns with the presence of datacenters within the community. The only call for service they reported receiving to the datacenter site itself was an extra attention to the site due to a terminated construction employee. Feel free to reach out if you have any further questions.

Feel free to reach out if you have any further questions.

Respectfully submitted,

Joseph L. Kennedy, Sheriff

Dubuque County Sheriff's Office

14928 Public Safety Way Dubuque, IA 52002-8216 Phone: 563-589-4170 Fax: 563-589-0015 E-Mail: tom.berger@dbqcoema.com

Thomas I. Berger, Coordinator Mike Wuertzer, Chairperson Dan Neenan, Vice-Chairperson

Date: October 22, 2026

To: Dubuque County Board of Supervisors

From: Thomas I. Berger, Emergency Management Coordinator

RE: Data Center Ordinance Development

In your process of creating an ordinance for Data Centers, I would like you to consider the following as it relates to emergency management. The core focus of emergency management is related to planning, training, exercises, equipment and organization.

Things to consider are as follows:

Training should be offered to the emergency responders as to the on-site hazards as well as any specific training needs due to the uniqueness of the operations. This could include

hazardous materials kept on site, response to battery fires/storage, and routine response for medical emergencies.

Training should be shared with emergency responders as to the safety aspects and equipment on site for use in an emergency.

Training should also be offered to any mutual aid fire department within Dubuque County as well as any adjacent county fire department or hazardous materials response team as determined by the fire chief that could reasonably respond to the facility.

Annual walk-through familiarization with emergency responders to ensure prompt and appropriate emergency response.

Facilities should consider working with emergency management and hosting an exercise that would allow emergency responders to interact and respond with facility staff/safety teams to ensure an adequate and appropriate response to an emergency/mass casualty incident on site.

- If specialized equipment is identified to respond to a data center emergency, the cost of the equipment and proper training should be funded by the owner of the facility.

I had the chance to meet with other county emergency management coordinators last week at our fall meeting of the Iowa Emergency Management Association. They indicated to me that once the data centers are constructed, there is not a lot of interaction between the data centers and the emergency management agency. There is probably more interaction with fire and EMS for response plans and site visits. In Dallas County, the company is working with the local fire department to obtain additional equipment for the department to increase the department's response capabilities.

The coordinators did recommend that an emergency response plan for a data center be completed and include the local response agencies in the planning process. This should be the case for a data center or any other type of industry/business that the local fire department may have in their jurisdiction which may present special occupancy, hazards or impacts to agencies responding to an incident.

DUBUQUE COUNTY ZONING

TO: Dubuque County Board of Supervisors

ＥＤＲ

FROM: Ed Raber, Planning & Development Dir., Ed.Raber@dubuquecountyiowa.gov, 563-690-3035

DATE: October 22, 2026

RE: Data Center Gap Analysis – Surface & Groundwater Testing and Monitoring

As the County investigates the impacts of data centers, gaps are identified in our ability to measure or fully understand a particular metric or condition. The availability of groundwater is a metric that the County or State does not have available data on to provide an understanding for good decision making.

There is a considerable amount of ongoing surface water and well testing going on across Dubuque County, including some testing being conducted by Dubuque County. There is an opportunity to enhance the existing testing into more of a monitoring regimen and expand its gap areas of availability of groundwater, not just its condition.

The Dubuque County Watershed Department has conducted routine monthly surface water testing at 58 sites across the County's HUC-12 sub-watersheds. A dashboard of testing results for all sites can be accessed through the website, www.dubuquecountywatersheds.org. The Watershed Department developed this dashboard in the summer of 2026, and is working to build on that to create additional ways for users to track individual testing sites and to see test results over time.

The hand-collected water samples are tested for the following metrics:

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The Dubuque County Public Health Department’s Environmental Health division conducts private well testing for private well owners at their request. Health Departments throughout the state conduct similar testing. Dubuque County Public Health Department applies annually for Private Well Grant funding through the state of Iowa. Testing is not done routinely but rather at the request of well owners. Test results funded through the grant are required to be entered into the Iowa Well Information System (IWIS), a public statewide database.

A private well is entirely managed by the well user, including the water supply well, the water distribution system, and all treatment systems. A private water supply connects to fewer than 15 individual connections (like homes, apartments, camp spaces, etc.) and provides water for less than 25 individuals per day. The County Public Health Department permits private well construction.

The County's grant-funded testing program may provide testing of private wells for the following:

In addition, the Public Health Department partners with the Iowa State Hygienic Laboratory to offer additional private well testing. The most commonly requested tests include:

○ Nitrate ◐ Arsenic ◐ Manganese ○ Arsenic/Manganese Combined ○ Lead ○ Iron ○ Sulfate ○ Sulfide ○ Fluoride ○ Hardness

○ Total Dissolved Solids

○ Total Suspended Solids

Public water systems (PWS) are routinely monitored and tested by certified operators in compliance with Iowa DNR standards and the federal Safe Drinking Water Act rules. There are about 70 public wells in Dubuque County, including 10 owned by the Dubuque County Conservation Dept. The Conservation Dept. director and staff are certified to collect the well tests. Other public well systems include municipal wells, and rural operations where the well serves over 25 users per day, such as restaurants, etc. The public can access historical public well testing results statewide at the IWIS well search database.

These public well tests provide an insight into groundwater conditions. One of the things that makes Dubuque County and other northeast Iowa counties somewhat unusual is our karst soils which facilitate

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the transfer of surface waters to groundwater. There are multiple groundwater aquifers, some of which are confined and others that interact with surface water.

Routine public well testing includes monitoring for:

Through collaborative work in the Zoning, Watershed, and Health Departments, we are preparing a presentation on historical public well test results for Dubuque County and statewide. This should be available in the next few weeks.

The County has identified a gap in its understanding of groundwater availability, including its recharge rate, and any cyclical variation. This was pointed out by Iowa State Geologist, Keith Schilling during his presentation at NICC in August.

Our collaborative department efforts have been reviewing some options for how to develop an understanding of the groundwater status in Dubuque County. We have connected with Johnson County that has recently updated a USGS aquifer analysis and model. This was an expensive process and does not include ongoing monitoring, but does create a useful water model that can be a resource for municipal and public well owners.

We have also engaged with Linn County and a private Midwest company that provides non-intrusive technology to monitor water “height” in existing wells. With the number of public wells, including the County Conservation wells and municipal wells, and others, this could create a geographically diverse way to monitor groundwater levels in real time, and with time, a historical trend or pattern.

As our investigations continue, we anticipate providing a report later this year, possibly with budget suggestions and possible opportunities for interjurisdictional collaboration.

This would go hand in hand with the well testing for contaminants, and the surface water testing already being conducted.

The goal of these monitoring and testing regiments would be to