Citizen Complaint, Chigger Ridge Road.

 

Flight courtesy of SouthWings

On July 30, 2026 on a routine surveillance flight over the Hurricane Creek watershed I happened to see this excavation sitting right behind the ball park along Hwy 216. The streak of red dirt looked almost as large as the ballpark itself. 

There is a connection to this development and enforcing something as big as a data center 

A lot of things have taken place since that first flight surrounding the first data center. Then there was 1 then 3 and now a 4th one is rumored to be built in the very headwaters of Hurricane Creek, an impaired stream with federal protection with a TMDL, Total Maximum Daily Load which sets restrictions for parameters like turbidity and sediment. These unchecked subdivisions are also the main sources of this type pollution in the country, not just here. 

Hurricane Creek behind the Middle School

 This post is a bit long and in-depth because of the circumstances. Normally I would file the complaint with the state and that's it. This time however I felt it that it was too important to ignore. 

There is a confirmed data center permitted for the Brookwood area and the environmental consequences could be quite dire. We know of 2 more such data centers heading for the watershed and ALL are in the headwaters of the creek which for the most part has not been as severely impacted as some of the lower stretches. 

I finally got enough information to file an official complaint with Alabama Department of Environmental Management (ADEM). I also filed an inquiry to the ADIR AML Division (Abandoned Mine Land's). 

ADEM confirmed that the site was excavated and developed without a state permit for such activity.  The  National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System (NPDES) permit states what the developer can and can not do. The permit is not just a suggestion, it is the law.

The permit requires that a site plan and "Best Management Plan" (BMP) must be submitted with all potential outfalls to the main stream. In this case that stream is Blanchet Branch, a tributary of Hurricane Creek. They had no such plan on file. According to Brookwood Engineer, Colins Espy no such development can proceed without a specific plan which is submitted and approved by the city. In the short video clip here you can here hear him saying that the NPDES is required and must be presented during permitting. What happened at "The Villages at Brookwood" ( BLACK WARRIOR DEVELOPMENTS)  as it's known now?

After an inspection of the area I found that there was no NPDES posted at the entrance and several visible BMP deficiencies from the road. A drone flight over the excavation lead me to believe that it was bad enough to notify ADEM. If a developer does not post the permit at the entrance as prescribed by law then I can normally find issues throughout. 

One thing that stuck out to me was the memory of seeing this same site years ago and reporting it as an abandoned coal mine highwall. I first saw and reported it to AML division in 2006.

All of the Capstone campus was built on abandoned mine land. I remember when it was announced that all of the old AML works would be reclaimed being sort of excited. I even endorsed the project at first. The problem was that the construction company had no experience in AML reclamation and made a mess of it. Instead of covering the acid bearing soil, they just spread it out where it was level and tried to grow grass on it, which did not work. The water running through Blanchet Branch was so low in pH it would not sustain grass much less lush putting greens like one wold expect at a golf course. 

Tuscaloosa March 15, 2000.

The spoil piles were left as "esthetics" according to the developer. The highwall in question was also left intentionally. It was too problematic to deal with at the time according to them. When the development was first proposed in March of 2,000, I was the sitting chairman of the board for the Citizens Coal Council and working extensively on AML issues throughout the state so I had a seat at the table. I remember all of the promises of reclamation and spoke up when they deviated from the plan. I was kindly uninvited to any further meetings.   I have been watching it ever since.     

                                                           

Blanchet Branch, which runs through the "Villages at Brookwood"complex has been hammered by mining in the past and had very little of it left in any kind of shape to recharge the stream with clean water from north of the site. Right where the Brookwood City Park lies now was the last existing segment of the creek. At one time that segment belonged to the City of Brookwood and was held in reserve as potential addition to the current park. 

On Sept 04, 2002 the city council approved an ordinance making it surplus and selling it to one Mark Stanley, contingent on him supplying an engineering report. I have asked to see that report. I was told that I must file a records request with the city clerk. 

Surely such a report should include plans for remediating the highwall directly connected to the property on his land or avoid it all together. In fact, The state AML division contacted the owner between 2017 and 2021 offering to help reclaim it.

"Between 2017 and 2021, AML staff contacted this property owner to offer reclamation assistance for the highwall and surrounding site; however, the owner chose not to participate.

Jeffrey E. Butler Abandoned Mine Land Program Manager

Alabama Department of Workforce / AML Program"

 

So, that's the history of this site as I know it.  

 

Here's what it looks like today.  To me it appears that they intend building houses right over the abandoned highwall. 

According to the AML recommendations for building over such structures suggests the following , "Soil Compaction and Settling: Strip-mined land involves excavated and replaced earth ("spoils") that may lack natural compaction. Developers typically must provide certified geotechnical reports and engineered fill plans to ensure foundations will not shift or sink. [1]

• Subsidence and Highwalls: Edge properties risk slope failure or dangerous drops (highwalls) left from mining. Regulations require stabilization of these earth walls before development approval. [1]"

Did Brookwood approve and recommend this? No, In fact, on July 28 the city engineer issued a stop-work order for the disturbance without permit and non-compliance. Mr. Espey stated that was the first he knew about the site. This was in July but a nearby landowner sent me this video taken at Christmas time 2025, 7 months before being discovered by Brookwood inspectors. 

   

When I saw the level of disrepair and negligence to the sediment and erosion controls, I filed a complaint and photos were sent to them on 09/25/26. 

"Sirs,

Please accept the following complaint on behalf of Hurricane Creekkeeper and Friends of Hurricane Creek.

33°14'44.30"N 87°19'39.80"W

There is  large-scale excavation located off Chigger Ridge Road in Brookwood Al. Take Hwy 216 toward Tuscaloosa, turn left onto Chigger Ridge Road. Just past the Brookside community, turn left onto a road to a truck parking area. at the fork on the gravel road keep left. That is the entrance. There is no NPDES posted at the entrance as required by law. I can not find reference to it in Efile. If there is a permit, please send me the correct number.

Along the entrance there are drainages under the road with improperly installed or completely failed BMP.

All of these drainages lead to an unnamed tributary to Blanchet Branch which has been hammered by past coal mining and in fact a large portion of the site is old mine works with no reclamation or stabilization of an abandoned coal mine highwall at one end. 

I found this online and think it pertains to this exact type of development

""Soil Compaction and Settling: Strip-mined land involves excavated and replaced earth ("spoils") that may lack natural compaction. Developers typically must provide certified geotechnical reports and engineered fill plans to ensure foundations will not shift or sink. [1]

• Subsidence and Highwalls: Edge properties risk slope failure or dangerous drops (highwalls) left from mining. Regulations require stabilization of these earth walls before development approval. [1]"

The entire site drains to Blanchet Branch which is a tributary to Hurricane Creek. As you know, there is an EPA approved TMDL for Hurricane Creek and its tributaries. I do not believe this site meets any of the parameters in the TMDL.

Please inspect  at your earliest convenience. ADEM should consider a "Cease and Desist" order ASAP until the site meets all permitting requirements including an NPDES, Site plan and remediation plan for the highwall.

Their response was as expected, they did not have a permit and were under enforcement Action.

"John,

We inspected the site in response to your complaint and determined the site is not permitted, which is one of the reasons for the pending enforcement action.  Our enforcement action will require them to submit a permit application, obtain permit coverage, and ensure proper BMPs are implemented.

 

The inspection report and enforcement documents will be available in e-FILE once the enforcement action is complete.  In addition, the permit application and all that information will be in e-FILE as well once it is submitted.

 

Scott Hughes, Chief

Field Operations Division

ADEM

The project began as early as winter of 25. A citizen living next to it posted the video below right after Christmas of the trees being ripped down. The stop work order did not start until July. It's hard for me to believe that no one at city hall knew anything at all about it until July when they first inspected it. City Engineer, Collins Espey issued a stop work order, shutting them down for non-compliance after that inspection. They had applied for a permit July 24, 26, which did not go into effect until August. 28. My complaint was filed 3 days prior. It is against the rules to begin excavation before those requirements are met. When and if the inspections files become available on Efile, I will post them.

How is it that this went on for months without a permit when the Brookwood engineer stated in the council meeting on 07/21/26 that the rules apply to "EVERYONE"? (video above) 

 

This is happening just a stone throw from city hall and visible from 216 in the winter. Didn't councilman Stanley state for the record that developers must "follow the guidelines"? How can we trust Brookwood to be the front line of defense over a project as large as a multi-billion dollar data center when they can't take care of issues right at their doorstep?

 

These data centers that are coming are huge by comparison to the subdivision above. The companies developing these centers are billionaires who pay more for a company dinner than ADEM and certainly Brookwood can or will levy in penalties. 

 

Councilman Mark Stanley stated for the record in a written statement that he believes ADEM, Hurricane Creekkeeper and the EPA will keep things environmentally safe out there. Actually he showed how little he actually knows about enforcement in Alabama.  

 

Now that Brookwood has zoned this into the city limits, they, Brookwood are the first line of defense against permit violations. It will be Brookwood building inspectors who make sure all of the standards are met. In this case, I do not believe they are up to the task and have admitted in council meetings that they do not really know what to expect.

 

How many server racks lined with hundreds of servers has Brookwood inspected? Will there be specific data center training for the inspectors? Who will train them? 

 

Even in Tuscaloosa, the building inspectors are the front line of defense against polluters. In most cases, they do intervene but often they fail to adequately address the situation. ADEM does NOT step in until called by someone like me or another citizen advocate. ADEM doesn't have the resources and manpower to go out and search for non-permitted developments like this one. They too depend on municipalities to take the first steps in compliance. EPA is nonexistent in local enforcement and has always deferred to ADEM in such matters. When all of these steps fail, which predict they will, we have to step in and take action, AFTER the damage is done in most cases.

 

What assurances do we the people have that Brookwood officials will initiate and enforce strong enough protections to prevent excavations hundreds of acres at a time from discharge pollutants? There isn't even a development plan for any such industry so no one knows what to expect. No one knows what to protect from. No one knows enough to throw the community under the bus for money.

 

People throughout Tuscaloosa County could very well be effected by decisions made without all of the facts. Everyone who uses the creek for whitewater recreation or just the peaceful hikes on the trails should be up in arms about what I describe as a reckless and uninformed decisions made by people who seem not to care beyond the potential money coming. On 09/25/26 the council admitted that they did not know what was coming and had no plan for potential discharges. Mr. Espey said for the record "We will cross that bridge when we come to it." People need better assurances than that I am afraid. 

 

A council member recently remarked that "I wish more people would come to the council meetings". I couldn't agree more. That is what these data center developers depend on. Small communities in economic distress and a community too apathetic to take part in local decisions. Many choose not to attend due to the mayor interrupting and commenting on anything he doesn't agree with. A mayor like Mr. Barger who wants to see economic development regardless of the consequences is ripe for the picking. He gets to decide to take the bait and the whole community is on the hook from now on without all the facts. Honestly I do not believe the council actually knows what is in store.

 

There's way too many risks yet unanswered and issues being dismissed by the mayor as misleading. We can't ALL be wrong Joe!

 

Slow down.  

Hurricane Creek Surveillance Flight

 Hurricane Creek Flyover 

Summer 26

All flight photos courtesy of SouthWings

I have to give a huge shout out to SouthWings for another successful surveillance flight over Hurricane Creek. With their help I can survey the entire watershed in a matter of a couple hours that used to take days.  From the plane, I can see any potential pollution sourced and where the access to them is located.

Today's flight started out from Tuscaloosa airport in a pretty thick haze. Ordinarily that would be a problem but I was not there to get scenery photos.

Hurricane Creek enters Black Warrior River

I always like to start at the confluence of the Black Warrior River and Hurricane Creek. I had seen some dark foam on the river and suspected it may be coming from the creek. I was gratefully surprised to find it was not us this time. Heavy rain upstream had the river running pretty strong. It was clear that the foam was coming from the open flood gates at Holt Lock and Dam.

 

 

Holt Lock under repairs

  

 

 

 

 

The dam has been under construction for some time now. From here I can see down into the lock pit

Holt Lock and Dam, Black Warrior River

Black Warrior reclamation 2026

Next we flew up to Fleetwood to check on Black Warrior Minerals coal mine reclamation. It looked pretty good and has been in reclamation since about 2016.

Black Warrior Minerals reclamation, 12/18/15

A little farther to the north is the Town of Brookwood Alabama. Brookwood is in the middle of a big battle over the coming of a data center not for away. I saw a new patch of bare red dirt behind the ballfields complex that I will have to inspect from the ground. I'm not sure what it is but I will find out and report back.

The town of Brookwood is not that large and for the most part, working class people who knew little or nothing about data centers or the total impacts to a small community like this, but it seems now, that there's one coming.

You can see the road that runs from the center left of the photo and leads to the top of the photo. That is the Brookwood Parkway where a massive data center is planned. That road was built to encourage sustainable light industrial use. Recently the land was purchased by a Korean company specializing in finding and procuring large tracts of land in rural areas for these huge campuses.

New housing is about 200 yds from the "project"

It's hard to believe anyone could consider a hyper-data center as "light" use. The amount of power data centers use is incredible. Alabama Power Co (APCO) just recently increased the size of the transmission lines running to the Mercedes plant due to increase demand for power at Mercedes. That line runs across my land and will not be enlarged without another fight. Someone needs to explain to me what the need is first and then why does it have to be so intrusive and secret. 

 

The mayor claimed not to have any information about a data center but then went on for 8 and 1/2 minutes explaining details about employment, environmental impacts, number of jobs, and other details which seemed like a lot of information for someone who claimed not to know anything about it. 

 

At the Brookwood city council meeting on 07/21 26 the mayor admitted that he signed an NDA (non disclosure agreement).  That may explain how he comes to be so familiar with a project he claims doesn't exist yet... At least available for the public. 

The mayor claimed there would be thousands of jobs which may be true during construction but the truth is...

A typical data center employs a small skeleton crew per shift, usually ranging from 3 to 10 people on-site, depending heavily on automation and total power capacity. Total permanent staff for a facility generally maps to about 0.15 to 0.35 workers per megawatt (MW), meaning larger campuses run lean relative to their massive size. 

Staffing Breakdown Per Shift
* Core Operations & Engineers: 1 to 4 critical facility engineers or systems technicians monitoring power, cooling, and network uptime.
* Security Personnel: 1 to 5 security guards managing physical site access and perimeter monitoring.* Shift Leadership / Support: 1 shift lead or network operations center (NOC) specialist overseeing immediate response tasks.

APCO power sub-station feeding Mercedes

 

  The mayor also claimed in error that the "power is already there". I beg to differ. Recently APCO took part of my land in imminent domain to build this power line leading to Mercedes Benz. Yes, there are power lines in the area, but not enough power to handle a hyper-data center and Mercedes Benz. 

 This is a photo taken taken 07/30/26 showing the new sub-station. station. There is power there but will it be enough to supply both? Not according to APCO claims when the took my land.  

 

 

 

I took this shot for scale. The Mercedes footprint is roughly 690 acres.  The so-far undisclosed Brookwood project, which most of us believe is a data center is between 1,200 and 1,800 acres of disturbance according to who you talk to. Nearly twice the area of the current Mercedes plant.

There will be a lot more on the Brookwood data center story after the planning and zoning meeting which is 8/11 at 6:00. at the Town Hall. I am urging all Brookood citizens concerned with this issue to attend and ask any questions you may have. None of your questions should ever go unanswered. The mayors entire speech in which he says he doesn't know anything can be seen below.

My main objective for this flight was to help people get a better understanding of what "the project" looks like from a wide perspective. I am so blessed to have a flight service like SouthWings to get me up in the air. 

 

 

Leaving the Brookwood I took a path to an old familiar pollution source at the Miller Crossing development in Peterson. This was the site back in 2025. 

 

 

Millers Crossing in 2026 doesn't look like they are even working on it. I see some issues that I will have to ground-truth to be sure if they are in compliance.

 

 

 

Down the road from Millers Crossing, I saw a sand pit I have been watching for some years and they looked to be in good shape from the air.

Heading back over Holt, I had a look at another old pollution source, Eagle Bluff landfill (buzzards roost as it was called by locals. It has been closed for several years now and is in "reclamation". It looked pretty good and I noticed a new flume ditch where an old clay ditch had been problematic for years.

 Like I said, all in all it looked much better that when it was operational.

 

 

 

 This photo was taken 2022. Look at the mud stream leaving the landfill and flowing across cemetery property across the road. All of this was going on even during funerals.

That was the end of the official Hurricane Creek patrol but my pilot was kind enough to allow me a few detours for a few other interesting scenes.
For instance this one of the Friends of Hurricane  Creek property that was decimated by the tornado that hit Tuscaloosa in April 2011 

FOHC Holt Peterson Rd Property Apr. 2011

 

FOHC Holt Peterson Rd Property Apr. 2011

         

The  FOHC Holt Peterson Rd Property Apr. 2011                                                            

This is the same site today

Almost every flight I take leads me back across the spillway at Lake Tuscaloosa. It's almost mandatory to get at least one shot.

Lake Tuscaloosa Spillway and dam

On final approach I happened to get a shot of the new Northport Beaches and Lagoon project. People laughingly refer to it as the new Mount Northport. That's a subject for another post.

As always, I want to give a big thanks to SouthWings for another great flight!

This is the video clip of the mayors entire speech telling us how much he does not know about a project that isn't happening yet.