The Osage Nation Congress is being asked to support a proposal to let the tribe’s 12-member legislature have final say on any hyperscale data center development on tribal land.
The Tulsa Flyer reports the plan came from Osage Nation Congresswoman Angela Pratt who introduced ONCA 26-70, which would require any Osage Nation governmental entity to consult the tribe’s legislature before approving any hyperscale data center.
Osage Nation Congresswoman Angela Pratt introduced ONCA 26-70 on Friday. It would require any Osage Nation governmental entity to consult the tribe’s 12-member legislature before approving any hyperscale data center on tribal territory.
Pratt said a data center would impact more than just a single governing body, adding such AI facilities pose dangers to Osage lands and communities broadly.
“It’s something that the government needs to speak to as a whole,” Pratt said, explaining she filed the measure in response to the tribe’s ongoing discussion between the tribe’s minerals council and Google representatives over land in Sand Springs at the southern end of the Osage reservation. That’s where the tech giant wants to develop an 827-acre data center site known as “Project Spring.”
Project Spring was approved earlier this year by the Sand Springs city council but since some of the site is on tribal land, it can’t move forward without the sovereign tribe’s approval.
As noted in previous cases, including the most recent federal court decision on a wind farm ordered to be removed, the Osage Minerals Council oversees the tribe’s 1.47-million-acre oil and gas subsurface. Osage County is the only county where such mineral cases are not controlled by the Oklahoma Corporation Commission.
The Tulsa Flyer reported that most of the members of the tribe’s Congress Natural Resources Committee appeared to be receptive to the idea proposed by Pratt. However, a decision on Pratt’s plan was postponed. If the Osage tribe were to ban data centers on its land, it would not be the first Oklahoma tribe to take such an action.
Other tribes, including the Cherokee Nation, Seminole Nation of Oklahoma and the Kickapoo Tribe of Oklahoma, have banned data centers on tribal lands. The Muscogee Nation is currently investigating data center impacts to prepare future legislation.
