Charleston Report with Delegate Gary Howell

We have just completed a House-only Interim meeting, something that is somewhat unusual and the first of my legislative career. This approach was taken because the Senate chose to hold fewer interim meetings this year. However, with many pressing issues facing the state and the House taking the lead on several of them, the House felt it was important to continue the work and move these discussions forward. As a result, we proceeded with House-only meetings and worked through a very full agenda.

With data centers on the minds of many West Virginians, several presentations during the Interim meetings focused on the topic. The first presentation Monday morning came from a group of legislators, legislative staff, and executive branch officials who had recently attended a major data center conference in Northern Virginia. One of the biggest takeaways from that conference was that there is a great deal of misinformation surrounding what data centers actually are and what impact they have on the communities where they locate.
A significant amount of discussion centered on Loudoun County, Virginia, often referred to as “Data Center Alley.” Loudoun County welcomed the first major wave of large-scale data centers and today has the highest concentration of them in the United States. What many people do not realize is the dramatic impact those facilities have had on local tax revenues. Even though Loudoun County is already considered one of the wealthiest counties in America, data centers now generate nearly half of the county’s total revenue. As a result, county officials have been able to reduce the property tax rate every year since 2016, and Loudoun County now has the lowest property tax rate in Virginia.
In West Virginia, where property values and tax structures are very different from Northern Virginia, the impact could potentially be even more significant for local residents in counties that attract major data center investment.
We also learned that data center cooling technology is rapidly evolving away from the older, more water-intensive systems that many people still associate with the industry. A great deal of the public concern over water usage appears to stem from misconceptions that have been widely repeated online and in the media. In fact, one of the most frequently cited claims originated from a 2025 book that overstated the estimated water usage of a Chilean data center by a factor of 1,000. The author later issued a correction, but the original figure had already spread widely.
Modern data centers are increasingly being designed with closed-loop cooling systems that operate much like the radiator system in an automobile. As one presenter explained, you do not refill your car’s radiator every time you drive somewhere. The same principle applies here. These systems are typically filled once and then only require occasional topping off over time. In many newer facilities, restroom usage actually represents one of the largest ongoing sources of water consumption.
The water used within these cooling systems must also meet extremely high purity standards because of the tiny passages and sensitive components found in advanced electronics. In many cases, the water circulating through these systems is cleaner and more highly filtered than ordinary drinking water.
Giri Iyer, Senior Program Leader at Oak Ridge National Laboratory, also gave a presentation on data centers and the factors that influence where they choose to locate. One of the key points discussed was that data centers are heavily dependent on reliable and available electrical power, meaning they naturally gravitate toward regions with excess generation capacity and strong electric infrastructure. West Virginia currently has many areas that meet those requirements.
Other presentations expanded on how additional large-scale electrical users can actually benefit existing residential customers in a regulated utility environment like West Virginia’s. Because electric utilities have significant fixed costs tied to power plants, transmission systems, and infrastructure, adding major new users helps spread those costs across a larger customer base. That creates downward pressure on rates for everyone else using the system. In a regulated state such as West Virginia, where utility rates are overseen by the Public Service Commission, increased industrial demand from facilities like data centers could potentially help stabilize or even reduce residential electricity rates over time.
The House Finance Committee also received an update on implementation of the $199 million Rural Health Transformation Program from West Virginia Secretary of Health Arvin Singh. The program is designed to direct federal funding toward improving rural healthcare across the state through investments in preventative care, workforce development, technology modernization, and improved coordination among rural healthcare providers.
While committee members generally supported the overall goal of strengthening rural healthcare access, several concerns were raised during the meeting regarding the consultant selection process connected to the program. It appeared that no open bidding process had been used for the consultant contract, leading members to question how the company was selected. At the time of the meeting, the Secretary was unable to provide detailed information explaining the process used to award the contract.
Additional concerns were raised regarding whether some of the proposed funding would be used to duplicate programs and services that are already being provided through existing state healthcare systems and other state agencies. Committee members also questioned whether the agency may have exceeded the amount of administrative or overhead spending permitted under the federal guidelines tied to the program.
Because several questions remained unanswered during the meeting, the department was requested to provide more detailed written responses and supporting documentation to the committee for distribution to members following the meeting.
Those are some of the major highlights from the May Interim meetings. The June Interim meetings are scheduled to be joint House and Senate meetings and will be held at Canaan Valley Resort State Park. This will be the only Interim meeting scheduled outside of Charleston this year and will provide legislators with the opportunity to see many of the regional issues being discussed by local lawmakers and community leaders firsthand. Visiting an area in person often provides a much better understanding of the challenges, opportunities, and unique circumstances facing that region than can be gained through presentations alone.

If you need anything, have ideas on how to make West Virginia better, or need assistance dealing with a state agency, please feel free to contact me. I can be reached by email at Gary.Howell@WVHouse.gov or by phone at (304) 340-3191 at the Capitol.