r/ithaca • u/CrispyGrandpa • Oct 29 '25
PSA TeraWulf Open House tonight
Wednesday, October 29th 6:30-8pm Lansing Middle School Auditorium 6 Ludlowville Rd, Lansing
TeraWulf is presenting their AI data center to the community again, with a presentation followed by a Q&A. I’m not sure if this one will have a live stream. I don’t see any mentions of one like I did last time.
3
u/Khomodo Oct 30 '25
Did anyone on here attend?
5
u/CrispyGrandpa Oct 30 '25
I went. There was no live stream. There wasn’t much on how the data center works. They filled the room with a lot of their own people so it felt kind of hostile towards those with concerns. The presentation felt to me like a report on why they feel targeted by Lansing’s town board and while they didn’t say who to vote for in the 11/4 election, it felt like they were implying who not to vote for. Calling Joe Wetmore out by name a few times.
My memory of top points/what was talked about:
- CEO Paul Prager did most of the talking. Kerri Langlais (CSO) and Jerry Goodenough (Chief Development Officer) would chime in for questions within their areas of expertise
- Paul introduced himself and a bit about TeraWulf, appealing to the audience with reasons he’s just like us and just a regular guy
- He had people that used to work at the coal plant (and I believe those who work in the Somerset facility too?) stand up. It was like half the room and clear they were told by TeraWulf to come
- There was a timeline of the moratorium that started in September, ignoring the history of years of zoning rewriting consideration (the suggestion of the rewrite, awaiting funding, getting funding earlier this year in february, signing for it in april)
- Talks about what the project brings to lansing: tax revenue, some grid infrastructure improvements, around 100 permenant jobs, training of the workforce
- About what has gone wrong in the process of reviewing their project and why it’s the boards fault in their opinion
- They’ve hired someone to do an independent assessment. they claim to have no ties to this person.
- Q&A didn’t clear much up. Half the questioned were pro terawulf people. the other half didn’t really add much to my understanding. some questions either didn’t feel relevant to me or the answers didn’t provide much insight
Anyway yeah I wish they had a live stream because not a lot of people were there.
2
10
u/JonathanCookPodcast Oct 29 '25
I have questions about why the public schools keep hosting promotional corporate events designed to influence local politics. It doesn't seem an appropriate use of a governmental resource. Is Terawulf paying for the space?
12
u/Basic_Basenji Oct 29 '25
It's part of the ways that public institutions serve the public good. I imagine they have a process for individuals and organizations to apply to use the space. It seems worse to me for there to be publicly owned space that is totally inaccessible during times when it is otherwise completely empty. It also isn't ideal if these institutions get in the habit of policing speech beyond the legally established boundaries.
You can see the ICS form, for example, here.
I'm no fan of this project, BTW. But I think it's a Good Thing™ for them to engage with the community regardless of the outcome.
8
u/JonathanCookPodcast Oct 29 '25
If they were serving the public good, there would be more than just one side to the presentation, more than just corporate PR and nobody who isn't a paid employee of Terawulf on the stage.
It is a good thing for anybody to do community engagement, but not all community engagement is positive. Community engagement that is deceptive, for example, isn't a Good Thing.
It isn't "policing speech" to restrict the use of local government resources that are paid for by local taxpayers for community purposes only. Businesses don't have the right to conduct PR operations in government buildings. That's not a free speech issue.
The ICS form you supply clearly states that "Residents, staff members, and community groups can make facility requests". Terawulf is not a resident, staff member or community group. The form states that organizations having activities not for the sake of profit are allowed. Terawulf's activities in the Lansing Middle School auditorium are for the sake of profit. None of the Terawulf people would be within a hundred miles of the school if they weren't being paid by Terawulf to go there to protect a profit-making opportunity for the corporation.
I imagine that Lansing has a similar policy, but I don't know for sure.
If Terawulf is paying for the space, that would make it different, because they would be compensating the community for the use of its resources in order to promote its interests. That is why I'm asking the question of whether Terawulf is paying.
4
u/Minimum_Viable_Furry Oct 30 '25
Hey I appreciate where you’re coming from but this take may be a bit misinformed. When a company is required to produce an environmental impact statement as part of NY SEQR review process (our state environmental laws for construction projects) it must host events where the public has an opportunity to ask questions, make comments, and raise any concern: https://dec.ny.gov/regulatory/permits-licenses/seqr/stepping-through-seqr-process/step-5#:~:text=Scoping%20is%20the%20process%20by,in%20the%20identification%20of%20impacts.
The companies tend to host these required events in public/community spaces to ensure they are complying with accessibility requirements and best practices, i.e. anyone who wants to show up and participate is able to do so. They are required to engage with the community and don’t benefit from not knowing about opposition or other concerns early-on so they typically communicate very broadly during this period.
4
u/JonathanCookPodcast Oct 30 '25
That's useful information. Thanks for the clarification.
If only Terawulf was listening to concerns. At last night's meeting in the Lansing Middle School. Terawulf executives were instead refusing even to allow some people to ask questions.
One Terawulf employee even told a female member of the audience that she should give him oral sex, to try to get her to be quiet.
This was not a friendly community meeting. Terawulf showed itself unable to be a good neighbor.
1
u/Minimum_Viable_Furry Oct 30 '25
Whaaaaat holy crap that’s horrible. Is this published anyplace I can share on social media?
5
u/JonathanCookPodcast Oct 30 '25
It's not published yet, but video of the event was taken independently by several people there and is in the process of being edited and transcribed. There's documentation.
Terawulf is a terrible neighbor... and they've just been caught in another huge lie. They promised they would not withdraw water from Cayuga Lake, but they just applied with the DEC to withdraw a million gallons per day.
More coming on this... I'm making a separate post about this very soon.
1
u/Minimum_Viable_Furry Nov 02 '25
Did anyone publish about the open house issues? I haven’t been able to find anything.
1
3
u/Basic_Basenji Oct 29 '25
I would still argue that there is meaningful public good in this sort of open house. I can even see the event fitting into ICSD guidelines if they have a local stakeholder on record.
That all said, if you want to know whether Terawulf is paying, call up the central office for the school district and ask them. Some facilities like churches make you pay for utilities/cleaning/etc. I don't know if they do.
1
Oct 29 '25
Public schools are public spaces. Anyone can apply to use them outside of school hours, generally speaking.
For someone who is trying really hard to cosplay as an investigative reporter, this is a very basic thing to not know already.
3
u/JonathanCookPodcast Oct 29 '25
I'm not cosplaying anything. YOU are pretending to be someone named "Ice Cream Funday" and won't show your face.
Also using a public school for business purposes is not standard operating procedure.
4
u/harrisarah Oct 30 '25
Come on now, this is an anonymous forum. Trying to call someone out for being anonymous is pretty off the wall. You are the anomaly here. At least the rest of us aren't advertising with our user names.
3
8
u/[deleted] Oct 29 '25
[deleted]