Granbury is a small town with deep Hill Country roots, the kind of place where people know their neighbors and expect their city hall to keep them in the loop. In January 2026, a city council vote changed that feeling for a lot of residents.

The council annexed and rezoned the Knox Ranch property at 2801 W US Highway 377, a 2,100-acre parcel, from Hood County into the city limits for industrial use. Dallas-based Bilateral Energy LLC had proposed a power generation and data center project on the land, identified internally as "Project Patriot." Many residents say they were never clearly told that was the plan.

A Community That Showed Up

By July, frustration had turned into organized action. Resident Daniel Piatt presented the petitions at a council meeting, addressing the room with plain words: "I recognize that what we are asking tonight is extraordinary. A vote of no confidence is not something that should ever be requested lightly."

The coalition, Granbury Residents Against Data Center Rezoning at 116 W Bridge St, is led by attorney Steven Dias, resident Kellie Chewning, and planner Nikki Sopchak. Their no-confidence petitions named City Manager Chris Coffman and City Attorney Jeremy SoRelle, and their recall petitions named Mayor Jim Jarratt and four council members. The coalition, known as Grassroots Granbury, gathered more recall signatures against those council members than each of them received in votes during their own elections.

The lawsuit makes a pointed claim: that city officials deliberately staggered their arrival times when they toured a Bilateral Energy data center facility in Dallas before the vote, a move the suit says was intended to keep the group under the threshold that triggers the Texas Open Meetings Act. The suit calls for pausing further action on the project, revoking the original annexation, and awarding damages.

What Residents Are Weighing

People in Granbury are not all of one mind about growth and industry. The city has seen steady population increases, and there are neighbors who believe well-managed development could bring jobs and tax revenue to the area. The concern here is not development itself for many residents, it is the process. They want to know what is coming before it arrives, and they want a seat at the table when decisions are made about their backyard.

For supporters of the project, Knox Ranch represents private investment and economic opportunity in a region that has traditionally relied on small businesses, tourism along Lake Granbury, and the character of the historic downtown square. Some argue the city was working within its charter authority and that reasonable people can look at the same rezoning decision and reach different conclusions about its merits.

For those who signed the recall petition, the core issue is trust. When a city council tours a proposed industrial facility in Dallas and comes home to vote on rezoning without telling residents what they saw, it breaks a basic compact.

A Pattern Across Texas

Granbury is not alone in this fight. Cities like Taylor, Denton, and Weatherford are running parallel battles over data center zoning. Governor Abbott has called for banning data centers from rural Texas neighborhoods and has directed regulators to stop shifting grid upgrade costs to residential ratepayers.

Texas has become one of the most active states for data center investment, drawn by cheap land, a favorable power grid structure, and a business-friendly environment. That activity is real, and it is landing in communities that were not always prepared for what it brings, including new roads, infrastructure strain, water use, and the visual footprint of industrial-scale buildings on land that used to be open.

The situation in Granbury is a window into a larger question that small towns across the Lone Star State are starting to answer for themselves: how much change do they want, and who gets to decide? Learn more about the coalition's ongoing legal and civic work at their home base, 116 W Bridge St in Granbury, or check out the reporting from KERA News to follow the story as it develops.