Frederick County has struck a $110 million deal with the developer behind the massive Frederick Digital Campus in Adamstown, trading a shrunken data center footprint and a package of community investments for a legal guarantee that the project's zoning cannot be touched by future county councils. County Executive Jessica Fitzwater announced the agreement Tuesday, framing it as an unprecedented win that reduces the impact of already-approved development while funding schools, parks and lower energy bills in the surrounding community.
The draft agreement, submitted as a formal Development Rights and Responsibilities Agreement application, is open for public comment through September 10 before it heads to the Frederick County Planning Commission and a public hearing, according to WFMD. As part of the deal, master developer Catellus agreed to cut its planned data center footprint on the former Eastalco industrial site from 18.3 million square feet to 15 million square feet, a nearly 20 percent reduction, and to slash daily potable water usage by almost 80 percent. As DC News Now reported, Catellus will also set aside 433 acres of the campus as nature reserve.
Where the $110 Million Is Going
County officials said the investments trace directly back to the 2024 Data Center Workgroup final report, according to DC News Now's account. The single largest chunk, $40 million, is earmarked for a new community center and recreational space, while $30 million is set aside for renovations to Carroll Manor Elementary School. Another $14.5 million will fund a workforce development training center and career and technical education programs.
Smaller line items round out the package: $10 million for perimeter berming, planting and trails around the campus, $10.5 million for agricultural land preservation, $5 million for a community solar project meant to reduce energy bills for Adamstown residents, and $1 million for a new fire engine for the Carroll Manor Volunteer Fire Company. The agreement also includes renovations to a middle school and other community centers, per the outlet's reporting.
The $10.5 million for farmland preservation is designated to purchase permanent land preservation easements covering more than 1,300 acres in Frederick County, according to discussion of the draft agreement circulating among residents on Reddit. Fitzwater said the deal reduces the impact of already approved data center development and secures unprecedented investments in the community, per DC News Now.
A Zoning Freeze Beneath the Numbers
The financial package comes with a catch that has kept some residents skeptical even as the dollar figures grow. According to the draft agreement text discussed on Reddit, Catellus agreed to the $110 million benefit package in exchange for Frederick County committing to freeze local zoning laws for the site, guaranteeing the project can proceed at its specified density without future regulatory interference. That means no future county council can revisit the development rules governing the campus, regardless of how public sentiment shifts.
The tension is not new. In January 2026, the County Council voted to expand the Critical Digital Infrastructure overlay zone by 1,000 acres, and a grassroots group called the Frederick County Data Center Referendum Committee responded by collecting more than 21,000 validated voter signatures in an effort to put the county's expanded 2,600-acre overlay zone before voters in November, according to the Maryland Daily Record. Courts ultimately invalidated the petition, and in June the Maryland Supreme Court upheld a lower court ruling blocking the referendum entirely, a fight Hoodline covered in Frederick's data center court fight.
A Moratorium That Doesn't Apply Here
Following the Supreme Court ruling, Fitzwater issued an executive order on July 1 pausing new data center applications through the end of 2026, but explicitly exempting previously approved projects like the Frederick Digital Campus. That carve-out is why this deal can move forward even as the county's broader moratorium remains in effect, since the project's development rights were already locked in before the pause took hold.
Frederick's fight is one piece of a much larger statewide reckoning. At least a dozen Maryland jurisdictions enacted moratoriums, bans, or zoning restrictions on data centers between late 2025 and mid-2026, driven by concerns over power grid strain and land use, according to a review by MDBayNews. A Frederick County delegate also introduced state legislation, HB1534, earlier this year proposing strict environmental, noise and school-distance buffers for hyperscale data centers, a push Hoodline detailed in its report on the delegate's proposed data center rules.
From Aluminum Smelter to Server Farm
The 2,100-acre site sitting behind all of this, known as Quantum Frederick or the Frederick Digital Campus, has an industrial history of its own. It was previously home to the Eastalco aluminum smelting plant, which ran for four decades before closing in 2010 and undergoing years of remediation before redevelopment became possible, according to a local real estate blog's account of the site's history. Catellus has said the reduced footprint and water usage are intended to make the campus more sustainable and less dependent on county resources, a claim tied directly to the concessions built into this week's agreement.
Frederick County's pitch to data center developers extends beyond community benefit packages. The county assesses no local business personal property tax on equipment or computers, and pairs that with a Maryland state sales tax exemption for qualifying facilities that can last up to 20 years, according to Frederick County Economic Development. That financial backdrop helps explain why a project of this scale landed in Adamstown in the first place, even as the community benefits agreement now working through public comment tries to answer for its costs.
