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Farmer donates land for a park, city sells it for data center development

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Marees

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Farmer donates land for a park, city sells it for data center development — $10 gift became $10M for city government, with $30M tax expected over next decade​

News
By Mark Tyson published 12 hours ago
A solemn Texas deed ignored for profit.

Back in 1999, 87 acres of land in Taylor, Texas, was donated (nominal fee $10) to the city by a farmer, with a condition in the deed that it would be used for community parkland. In 2025, the land was sold for $10M to a data center developer, who has won several legal battles against the nearby residents who are trying to stop the massive construction project, reports 404 Media. Now, the disgruntled locals are planning to take their case to an appeals court.

council asserts that stopping this kind of development (in the city zone it is situated) is beyond its scope, and the millions in tax raised will benefit residents.

404 Media talked to long-time local Pamela Griffin, who used to play on the farmland, and watched her children grow up and enjoy the same freedom. Griffin recalled that old farmer Mr. Bland used to talk to her father from time to time. According to her, Bland once said to her dad, “I see the kids don’t really have nowhere to play.” He continued, “I’m thinking about giving this land for parkland because these kids need somewhere to play.” The original July 1999 deed has since been unearthed, and the farmer did indeed follow through with his words.

Now, let’s make the following chain of events simple using a bullet point timeline:
  • Pre 1999 – a farmer’s promise to his neighbors,
  • July 7, 1999 – Bland granted the land to the Texas Parks and Recreation Foundation, a public trust, for $10 on the condition it be used as a park,
  • 2003 - Texas Parks and Recreation Foundation granted the land to another non-profit called the Williamson County Park Foundation,
  • 2003, one month later, Williamson County Park Foundation gave the land to the City of Taylor,
  • 2008 - the city of Taylor sold the land to the Taylor Economic Development Corporation (TEDC) for $15,000,
  • 2025 – TEDC sold the land to data center developers Blueprint for $10 million.
https://www.tomshardware.com/tech-i...ent-with-usd30m-tax-expected-over-next-decade
 
Marees said:

Farmer donates land for a park, city sells it for data center development — $10 gift became $10M for city government, with $30M tax expected over next decade​

News
By Mark Tyson published 12 hours ago
A solemn Texas deed ignored for profit.

Back in 1999, 87 acres of land in Taylor, Texas, was donated (nominal fee $10) to the city by a farmer, with a condition in the deed that it would be used for community parkland. In 2025, the land was sold for $10M to a data center developer, who has won several legal battles against the nearby residents who are trying to stop the massive construction project, reports 404 Media. Now, the disgruntled locals are planning to take their case to an appeals court.

council asserts that stopping this kind of development (in the city zone it is situated) is beyond its scope, and the millions in tax raised will benefit residents.

404 Media talked to long-time local Pamela Griffin, who used to play on the farmland, and watched her children grow up and enjoy the same freedom. Griffin recalled that old farmer Mr. Bland used to talk to her father from time to time. According to her, Bland once said to her dad, “I see the kids don’t really have nowhere to play.” He continued, “I’m thinking about giving this land for parkland because these kids need somewhere to play.” The original July 1999 deed has since been unearthed, and the farmer did indeed follow through with his words.

Now, let’s make the following chain of events simple using a bullet point timeline:
  • Pre 1999 – a farmer’s promise to his neighbors,
  • July 7, 1999 – Bland granted the land to the Texas Parks and Recreation Foundation, a public trust, for $10 on the condition it be used as a park,
  • 2003 - Texas Parks and Recreation Foundation granted the land to another non-profit called the Williamson County Park Foundation,
  • 2003, one month later, Williamson County Park Foundation gave the land to the City of Taylor,
  • 2008 - the city of Taylor sold the land to the Taylor Economic Development Corporation (TEDC) for $15,000,
  • 2025 – TEDC sold the land to data center developers Blueprint for $10 million.
https://www.tomshardware.com/tech-i...ent-with-usd30m-tax-expected-over-next-decade
Click to expand...
Did you use AI to create that snappy bullet point timeline?
 
Marees said:

Farmer donates land for a park, city sells it for data center development — $10 gift became $10M for city government, with $30M tax expected over next decade​

News
By Mark Tyson published 12 hours ago
A solemn Texas deed ignored for profit.

Back in 1999, 87 acres of land in Taylor, Texas, was donated (nominal fee $10) to the city by a farmer, with a condition in the deed that it would be used for community parkland. In 2025, the land was sold for $10M to a data center developer, who has won several legal battles against the nearby residents who are trying to stop the massive construction project, reports 404 Media. Now, the disgruntled locals are planning to take their case to an appeals court.

council asserts that stopping this kind of development (in the city zone it is situated) is beyond its scope, and the millions in tax raised will benefit residents.

404 Media talked to long-time local Pamela Griffin, who used to play on the farmland, and watched her children grow up and enjoy the same freedom. Griffin recalled that old farmer Mr. Bland used to talk to her father from time to time. According to her, Bland once said to her dad, “I see the kids don’t really have nowhere to play.” He continued, “I’m thinking about giving this land for parkland because these kids need somewhere to play.” The original July 1999 deed has since been unearthed, and the farmer did indeed follow through with his words.

Now, let’s make the following chain of events simple using a bullet point timeline:
  • Pre 1999 – a farmer’s promise to his neighbors,
  • July 7, 1999 – Bland granted the land to the Texas Parks and Recreation Foundation, a public trust, for $10 on the condition it be used as a park,
  • 2003 - Texas Parks and Recreation Foundation granted the land to another non-profit called the Williamson County Park Foundation,
  • 2003, one month later, Williamson County Park Foundation gave the land to the City of Taylor,
  • 2008 - the city of Taylor sold the land to the Taylor Economic Development Corporation (TEDC) for $15,000
Click to expand...
The word DEVELOPMENT is in their name and you are surprised by what they did? /s
 
Should have had a contract written up that it reverts to the original owner or his descendants if any or all of the land ceases being used as a park.
 
Yeah, it's a parkland for servers.

I don't know much about Texas real estate law, but I did go find the deeds online at the Williamson County Clerk records site. The 1999 deed has the parkland requirement on the first page, the 2003 deed says the land is to be held in trust, the 2004 deed (that's supposed to be one month later in the bullet points, but is actually 3 months later) doesn't mention anything. The 2008 deed to the development corporation looks like the city got two smaller parcels (22.7 acres and 16.7 acres) and $15,000. I don't know what happened with those parcels ... someone else could try to find out, but I don't care that much.

I assume the $15,000 listed in the 2008 is a real amount. The $10-$20 listed in other deeds are suspicious numbers that I don't trust. It's always like $1 and other good consideration where they didn't really want to write the number in the deed... or it looks like for Texas you have to write $10.

Anyway, I don't know if the small note in the first deed is really binding. Especially since the 2004 deed appears to be an outright transfer and that was 22 years ago. There's a lot of stuff in law and precedent that when you don't object in a timely fashion, sucks to be you. Here's where someone with experience in Texas real estate law could give us real information instead of my old man babbling...

Here's the original deed if you want to look. Be kind to my server, it was easier than trying to link to the original on the clerk search page.
 
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I think the main problem is he gave the land away. Once you do that you really have no say -- it's not your land.

If they wanted it used as a park they should have leased it to the park foundation, and wrote in their will that whoever inherits the land must do the same or else forfeit the right to someone who will.
 
SmokeRngs said:
Pretty sure we used to string people up for doing things like this.

We should go back to that.
Click to expand...


I hate to say it, but I almost think that type of solution is the only recourse at this point.

Our government is just fucking broken. President just funneling money straight to family because no one can stop him. Big corpo data centers just winning due to lobbying bullshit and corrupt courts.

When the legal system is completely fucked, media owns public opinion, and the elite owns the media... what exactly do you do using the actual system as designed?

I keep backtracking on myself over the years thinking that I'm just being too doomer... only to have my projections just come true. Sigh.
 
Marees said:

Farmer donates land for a park, city sells it for data center development — $10 gift became $10M for city government, with $30M tax expected over next decade​

News
By Mark Tyson published 12 hours ago
A solemn Texas deed ignored for profit.

Back in 1999, 87 acres of land in Taylor, Texas, was donated (nominal fee $10) to the city by a farmer, with a condition in the deed that it would be used for community parkland. In 2025, the land was sold for $10M to a data center developer, who has won several legal battles against the nearby residents who are trying to stop the massive construction project, reports 404 Media. Now, the disgruntled locals are planning to take their case to an appeals court.

council asserts that stopping this kind of development (in the city zone it is situated) is beyond its scope, and the millions in tax raised will benefit residents.

404 Media talked to long-time local Pamela Griffin, who used to play on the farmland, and watched her children grow up and enjoy the same freedom. Griffin recalled that old farmer Mr. Bland used to talk to her father from time to time. According to her, Bland once said to her dad, “I see the kids don’t really have nowhere to play.” He continued, “I’m thinking about giving this land for parkland because these kids need somewhere to play.” The original July 1999 deed has since been unearthed, and the farmer did indeed follow through with his words.

Now, let’s make the following chain of events simple using a bullet point timeline:
  • Pre 1999 – a farmer’s promise to his neighbors,
  • July 7, 1999 – Bland granted the land to the Texas Parks and Recreation Foundation, a public trust, for $10 on the condition it be used as a park,
  • 2003 - Texas Parks and Recreation Foundation granted the land to another non-profit called the Williamson County Park Foundation,
  • 2003, one month later, Williamson County Park Foundation gave the land to the City of Taylor,
  • 2008 - the city of Taylor sold the land to the Taylor Economic Development Corporation (TEDC) for $15,000,
  • 2025 – TEDC sold the land to data center developers Blueprint for $10 million.
https://www.tomshardware.com/tech-i...ent-with-usd30m-tax-expected-over-next-decade
Click to expand...
No good deed goes unpunished :(
 
I always cringe when people donate land to the government because I have heard so many stories like this.

I get it. They want other people to be able to enjoy it, and they don't want to pay property taxes or take care of it. But neither does anyone else, and the people that end up in charge of it often don't care about that goal and are easily swayed by money.
 
zehoo said:
Should have had a contract written up that it reverts to the original owner or his descendants if any or all of the land ceases being used as a park.
Click to expand...

I read something the other day that in Texas, the original Deed stipulation apparently could be brought back. The person claimed that original deed's hold a lot of sway in Texas law and that they couldn't just remove this type of stipulation just by selling the land. I'd love to see them lose the case and force it back to being a park but given the money involved I doubt anyone with the motivation will have the cash to fight it in court.
 
Don't donate your land to the government. Even if by some miracle they do abide by your wishes, they'll still screw it up.

When I was growing up there was a park that used to be an old railroad baron estate. A really cool European style stone house up on a mountain surround by a curated forest. Beautiful garden with fountains and all kinds of stonework. Or at least it was at one time.

Of course, the government can't keep anything nice, so it was turned into park offices, not maintained and had some 70s looking "nature learning center" buildings thrown up, which I never even saw open. The fountain wasn't working, statuary broken down, garden overgrown.

We'd go there to hike in the forest (also not maintained to its original vision) and every time I would just think of how pissed I would be if I built this house for my family and they donated it to the state so they could go live in the city.
 
I found where it is on google maps
https://www.google.com/maps/@30.565...try=ttu&g_ep=EgoyMDI2MDYwMy4xIKXMDSoASAFQAw==

I am skeptical they ever even fulfilled the original request way back in 1999. Street view only goes back to 2007 when the city owned it, and even then there are hay bales, meaning they weren't mowing it. There are no signs of anything ever being there, so at best it was a mowed open field for kids to play in a few years until it was given to the city.
 
sharknice said:
I found where it is on google maps
https://www.google.com/maps/@30.5653244,-97.3891885,571m/data=!3m1!1e3?entry=ttu&g_ep=EgoyMDI2MDYwMy4xIKXMDSoASAFQAw==

I am skeptical they ever even fulfilled the original request way back in 1999. Street view only goes back to 2007 when the city owned it, and even then there are hay bales, meaning they weren't mowing it. There are no signs of anything ever being there, so at best it was a mowed open field for kids to play in a few years until it was given to the city.
Click to expand...

Also if you look just to the west of that area on the other side of the houses they have a real park where they built a playground and basketball court around the same time the city sold the land that was donated. Maybe they used that money they got selling the land to help build a real park.
 
sleepeeg3 said:
Hah which one? We've been printing money since the 80's.
Click to expand...

I think there's a slight semantic and ""nuanced"" difference between furtively funneling "minor" funds, which I'm sure was happening with some regularity, and where we're at now. Where there's just blatant corruption out in full display and you still have people just blindly supporting the man because the media complex has them so brainwashed that it just doesn't matter. This is the exact thing I told everyone years ago, and I mean literally years ago. This is just elites funneling more power and money into elite hands, and then tightening down the means of commoners to actually fight back in any meaningful way. It's just been happening quietly and we've gotten to the point where it's just possibly totally fucked. While ""AI"" can be a wonderful thing for the common person, it's being repurposed to accelerate this vector instead.

As an example--and to be clear, I'm linking the following video with the full understanding and realization that this podcast is sort of "a bunch of intelligent-but-unqualified guys shooting the breeze", but I found this to be pretty funny because he's actually quoting exactly from history--here's a video snippet:

View: https://youtu.be/YlPDNJXYWgY?t=1669

As he points out, one of the largest scandals from several decades ago, we're looking at ~9 million dollars in today's money. Today we have our leaders making a fucking bitcoin variant, blatantly having their families invest in assets (Intel, anyone?) that they are summarily causing to rise or drop, getting taken out to lunch by our wonderful GPU/CPU company CEOs as basically hush money (which they literally advertise as taking lol). And meanwhile, their core constituents just still blindly support them. And worse, none of them had the initial intelligence to see any of this coming even if they didn't (ie back when the writing was clearly on the wall and they voted for who they did anyway). The only practical reason people are actually pissed about the current administration is gas prices. Just fucking gas prices. Epstein files? Not even talked about that much anymore. All the other scandals? What scandals?

I think we're "cooked", as the younger generations would put it. I just don't see how we don't end up in complete idiocracy land. We're probably already there. This land deed situation is just symptomatic. The current "circular GPU/CPU economy" situation is also symptomatic. Dunno how much of this gets into soap box territory so I'll just stop there. I would love to be wrong, too. It's not like I like being doomer and depressed.
 
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I mean... considering this country was founded on the basis of coming over here and taking land from the native/indigenous people that lived here originally.. are you shocked ...
Our governments have been stealing/pillaging/plundering/scheming for hundreds of years...

( this is probably for soapbox :ROFLMAO: )
 
1_rick said:
It's worth remembering that the Federal government literally couldn't operate a whorehouse at a profit.
Click to expand...
Technically, the government would hand it over to a private company who would then successfully operate for a profit, but at the detriment of the citizens. The problem is that the government and private companies are constantly sucking each other off.
 
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Looking up videos of how much noise modern server farms make it's pretty clear why no one wants to leave anywhere near one. 24/7 high pitched whine for miles around.

The farmer trying to do the poor end of town a favour by giving them more parkland instead has cursed them to the never ending drone of cooling towers etc.
 
zehoo said:
Looking up videos of how much noise modern server farms make it's pretty clear why no one wants to leave anywhere near one. 24/7 high pitched whine for miles around.

The farmer trying to do the poor end of town a favour by giving them more parkland instead has cursed them to the never ending drone of cooling towers etc.
Click to expand...
I mean, that sounds like a dream to me....masking my tinnitus for free?


View: https://www.youtube.com/shorts/dvOuZmmJm7A

Hell, I might just use that sound to help me sleep....
 
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