Hillsboro’s data center amendment is an acreage cap, not a zoning change
The Phase I code amendment recommended to City Council does not only narrow which zones allow data centers. It sets a fixed ceiling on the total acreage the use may occupy citywide, and the City’s own parcel inventory shows most of that ceiling is already consumed.
The claim
There is no claim being graded here. Coverage of the amendment, including the City’s own public summaries, has described it in terms of which zones allow the use. The acreage ceilings appear in the order’s exhibits and in a staff presentation, and had not been set against the City’s published inventory.
The record
Draft Order No. 8502, Case File No. CDCA-004-26, recommended by the Hillsboro Planning Commission on September 9, 2026, together with Exhibits A, C and D; plus the August 26 hearing version and August 12 work-session presentation. Retrieved from the City of Hillsboro meeting portal on September 14, 2026.
The finding
Under Draft Order No. 8502 as recommended, data storage and processing is permitted as a primary use on no more than 608 acres citywide; the City’s inventory of sites built or in permitting as of August 19, 2026 totals 557.46 acres in those zones.
The caps
| Zone or sub-area | Ceiling | Built or permitted | Remaining |
|---|---|---|---|
| I-P Industrial Park | 215 | 203.17 | 11.83 |
| I-S Meek sub-area | Prohibited | 0 | — |
| I-S Jackson East–South | 62 | 62 | 0 |
| I-S Jackson East–North | 21 | 0 | 21.00 |
| I-S all other sub-areas | 310 | 292.29 | 17.71 |
| Total | 608 | 557.46 | 50.54 |
The Jackson East–South ceiling and acreage already built or permitted there are the same figure: 62 acres. The record does not state whether that correspondence is deliberate.
For scale: Hillsboro contains 17,378 total acres, and Washington County more than 465,000. The 23 existing data center sites occupy roughly 570 acres — about 3.3 percent of the city.
What this does not establish
- The order is a Planning Commission recommendation, not an adopted ordinance.
- The ceilings could change before adoption.
- Remaining acreage is not the same as developable acreage.
- The ceilings govern data storage as a primary use; accessory storage is limited separately.
- This finding takes no position on whether a ceiling of any size is appropriate.
Status
A first reading before City Council was scheduled for September 15, 2026. The published agenda and packet for that meeting list no item concerning this case file; Staff Report No. 5 states the first reading is October 6, 2026.
Funding
Self-funded. No party commissioned, reviewed, or was shown this finding before publication.
Reproduction
The ceilings are in Exhibit A and Exhibit D to Draft Order No. 8502 and in the August 12 work-session presentation. The inventory acreages are the City’s own, in Exhibit C.
The pre-amendment baseline — 6,333.5 acres of industrial land citywide, of which 4,276.3 acres sit in zones where the use is currently allowed — was computed from the City’s published zoning layer and validated to 0.26% against the City’s published total city acreage.