THE LAUNCH DOCK

Emergency Planning Is a Forecast

Emergency infrastructure is not built for hypotheticals.
It is built for scenarios planners believe are plausible.

Fire stations do not appear overnight.
They require modeling, justification, funding, staffing, equipment, and long-term operational commitments.

When communities approve new fire stations tied—directly or indirectly—to proposed industrial projects, they are not engaging in abstract preparation.

They are acknowledging risk.

The question communities are now asking is not emotional.
It is rational:

Prepared for what—and who decided it was necessary?

Two Community Voices That Cannot Be Ignored

This newsletter is informed in part by two recent reader comments that deserve to be taken seriously:

These statements reflect a reality documented across the United States: most rural and semi-rural fire districts are not equipped to handle large-scale industrial or hazardous-material fires without significant external support (National Fire Protection Association [NFPA], 2023).

They raise a critical issue: emergency infrastructure is being approved in anticipation of risk—before public approval of the projects creating that risk.

What Happens If the Data Center Is Never Built?

Emergency infrastructure is not provisional.

Once a fire station is approved, constructed, staffed, and equipped, the costs do not disappear if a proposed data center stalls, relocates, or is never approved.

Fire station construction costs in the Midwest commonly range from $5 million to $15 million, depending on size, equipment, and land acquisition (U.S. Fire Administration, 2022). Annual operating costs—including staffing, training, maintenance, and equipment replacement—often exceed $1.5–$3 million per year for a single full-service station (International Association of Fire Chiefs [IAFC], 2021).

If a data center does not move forward, communities may still be left with:

• Long-term debt obligations (bonds, levies, financing agreements)

• Permanent staffing and training costs

• Maintenance and operational expenses

• Specialized equipment with limited alternative use

• Expanded service responsibilities without expanded revenue

In that scenario, taxpayers absorb the cost of preparing for a risk that never arrives.

The issue is not whether emergency preparedness is valuable.

The issue is whether risk-specific infrastructure should be publicly funded before risk-specific approval.

The Quiet Transfer of Financial Risk

When emergency infrastructure is approved in anticipation of industrial development, a subtle shift occurs:

Private risk becomes public cost.

Research on public–private development projects shows that when projects fail to materialize, municipalities are frequently left servicing debt and operational expenses originally justified by projected economic activity (Government Accountability Office [GAO], 2020).

If the data center proceeds, emergency capacity is framed as “necessary support.”
If the data center does not proceed, emergency capacity is reframed as “general community benefit.”

In both outcomes:

• The public pays

• Developers carry limited downside

• Decision-makers face little long-term accountability

This is not hypothetical.
It is a documented pattern in infrastructure-linked economic development.

Communities Without Adequate Emergency Planning Face a Different—but Equally Serious—Cost

In communities where emergency infrastructure has not been expanded, the risk does not disappear.

It shifts into other forms of harm.

Economic Impacts

Large industrial fires involving lithium-ion batteries, electrical infrastructure, or cooling systems often require multi-day response efforts, evacuations, and long-term site closures (Environmental Protection Agency [EPA], 2022). Economic impacts include:

• Business shutdowns during evacuations

• Agricultural losses from smoke and chemical deposition

• Insurance premium increases or policy withdrawal

• Declines in nearby property values

• Reduced community investment confidence

Ecological Impacts

Industrial firefighting runoff can contain heavy metals, fluorinated compounds, and chemical suppressants, which frequently enter groundwater and surface water systems (EPA, 2021). Rural communities relying on shared aquifers are especially vulnerable.

Public Health Impacts

Exposure to particulate matter (PM2.5) from large industrial fires is associated with:

• Increased emergency room visits

• Respiratory and cardiovascular strain

• Long-term health consequences, particularly for children and older adults
  (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention [CDC], 2023)

Without adequate planning, failure becomes expensive, prolonged, and irreversible.

Emergency Planning Is a Governance Signal—Not a Side Issue

Emergency preparedness decisions reveal what planners believe is plausible—even when those beliefs are not articulated publicly.

Fire stations, specialized equipment, and evacuation planning are based on risk modeling. Those models reflect assumptions about:

• Fire probability

• Toxic exposure

• Duration of response

• Regional mutual-aid capacity

If scenarios include:

• large-scale toxic fires

• prolonged evacuations

• multi-jurisdictional response

Then communities deserve to know why those risks were considered credible.

Preparedness without explanation is not transparency.
It is expectation management.

The False Choice Communities Are Being Given

Communities are often framed as choosing between:

• economic development or

• public safety scrutiny

This framing is false.

Responsible development integrates:

• transparent risk disclosure

• emergency planning aligned with approval milestones

• financial backstops if projects fail

• clear assignment of long-term costs

When these elements are missing, the issue is not progress.

It is governance.

Why Timing Matters More Than Intent

Once emergency infrastructure is built:

• It becomes normalized

• Its original justification fades

• Accountability dissolves

Studies of infrastructure lock-in show that once capital investments are made, reassessment becomes politically and financially difficult—even when original assumptions change (OECD, 2021).

That is why scrutiny before approval matters more than regret afterward.

What Communities Are Entitled to Ask—On the Record

Residents are justified in asking:

• What emergency scenarios justified new fire infrastructure?

• Were those scenarios tied to a specific proposed data center?

• What happens financially if the project does not proceed?

• Who bears long-term operational and staffing costs either way?

• Were alternative locations or development models evaluated?

• Why were these discussions not held publicly and sequentially?

These are not hostile questions.

They are governance questions.

Closing: Preparedness Without Transparency Is Not Safety

Emergency readiness should protect communities—not financially obligate them in silence.

Fire stations should follow public decisions—not precede them.

If a project requires emergency infrastructure to be safe, that requirement should be disclosed before approvals, not embedded quietly into budgets afterward.

Preparedness is not the problem.
Planning without consent is.

In solidarity,
Lyndsay LaBrier
Merchant Ship Collective
The Launch Dock

References

Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. (2023). Health effects of exposure to wildfire and industrial smoke. https://www.cdc.gov

Environmental Protection Agency. (2021). Firefighting foam and chemical runoff risks. https://www.epa.gov

Environmental Protection Agency. (2022). Emergency response considerations for large industrial fires. https://www.epa.gov

Government Accountability Office. (2020). Public–private partnerships: Fiscal risks to state and local governments. https://www.gao.gov

International Association of Fire Chiefs. (2021). Fire service budget and staffing trends. https://www.iafc.org

National Fire Protection Association. (2023). Rural fire department capabilities and response limitations. https://www.nfpa.org

Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development. (2021). Infrastructure governance and investment lock-in. https://www.oecd.org

U.S. Fire Administration. (2022). Fire station construction costs and planning considerations. https://www.usfa.fema.gov