Meta will invest $10 billion in a nearly 3,000-acre data center campus in Mason County, Kentucky, under a community benefits agreement passed by county commissioners on October 13. The figure could grow in future phases, and the project carries a 40-year property tax break.

The Ledger Independent first identified Meta as the developer behind the project at the Fiscal Court meeting. What does this change for the county? Roughly 4,000 construction jobs, 300 long-term operational roles, and annual payments running into the millions of dollars per development phase.

What does the agreement contain?

Under the deal approved October 13:

• $10 billion initial investment from Meta, with headroom for expansion in later phases.
• More than 4,000 construction jobs and 300 permanent positions once the campus is operational.
• $115 million from Meta for infrastructure: roads, water treatment plants, and pipelines.
• Annual payments to the county in the millions of dollars per phase.
• A 40-year exemption from local property taxes, backed by $800 billion in Industrial Revenue Bonds (IRBs, municipal bonds used to finance private industrial projects), estimated at $10 billion per phase.

How did the project surface?

Word of a massive data center campus in the area first broke in November 2025, when an anonymous developer was evaluating 5,000 acres near Big Pond and Tuckahoe roads. In May, the county rezoned a 2,080-acre parcel for data center use.

Planning documents point to six data center buildings of 718,740 sq ft (66,773 sqm) each, plus three substations. Reported power capacity could reach 2.2GW (gigawatts). That's hyperscale territory — enough to power a mid-sized city.

What is Meta saying?

Meta said: "We're grateful to the Mason County fiscal court for its careful review. With this potential project, we'll not only pay the full cost of the power we use, but we'll invest directly in Mason County — in schools, workforce training and local infrastructure — guided by what local leaders and residents tell us they need. We take seriously the diversity of opinions in the county, and we intend to keep showing up and listening, not just during the approval process but in the long run."

Mason County Judge Executive Owen McNeill added: "This agreement with Meta represents the hard work of many dedicated individuals and organizations that envisioned a brighter future for Mason County and all of our residents. Meta represents the pinnacle of technology companies that only a few short years ago, we would have never dreamt would invest here. For our community, closer to the rural end of the spectrum than urban, their investments positively address just about every issue our communities are facing today and will greatly bolster them well into the future."

Local opposition persists

Not everyone is on board. A petition against the project had gathered 1,429 signatures at the time of writing. Residents have raised concerns about the campus, its scale, and its footprint on rural land.

The vote clears the formal path for construction, but with six hyperscale buildings, 2.2GW of potential power draw, and four decades of tax exemption on the table, Mason County residents will live with the consequences — favorable or otherwise — for a very long time.