Local Brief
'Burb Bites: Boone County mulling data center moratorium
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This week's news from around the region includes a data center moratorium, a volleyball heartbreak and a young local poet going national.
🚫 Boone County officials are considering a one-year moratorium on data center development.
- The Boone County Area Plan Commission unanimously voted to send a favorable recommendation for the moratorium to the Boone County Commissioners, who will make the final decision.
- The pause would give the county time to develop a zoning framework for data centers.
- It would not impact the $10 billion Meta data center campus being constructed in Lebanon.
🏠 Also in Boone County, the Zionsville Town Council has rejected a plan to build 173 homes and 50,000 square feet of commercial space along U.S. 421.
- The Woodland Grove PUD proposal from Carmel-based petitioner Steve Pittman was shot down in a 5-2 vote, despite it getting a favorable recommendation from the Zionsville Plan Commission in March.
- It was slated for the east side of U.S. 421 between East County Road 200 South and East County Road 300 South.
🏐 The Indy Ignite will not return to the Fishers Event Center as Major League Volleyball champions.
- The top-seeded Ignite were upset by the Omaha Supernovas in five sets in opening round of MLV Championship tournament.
- "I feel very disappointed for the girls that worked so hard this season and that I couldn't help them get over the line in that fifth set," Ignite coach Lauren Bertolacci said after the game. "They deserve to be fighting for a championship, and I believe that with all my heart. Unfortunately for us, it wasn't the night tonight."
📖 Jayda Dawn, a Fishers resident and junior at University High School in Carmel, won the 2026 Poetry Out Loud National Championship in Washington, D.C.
- With the win, she will receive a $20,000 award and $500 for her school to purchase poetry materials.
- "You don't get a lot of time to actually live in poetry, and oftentimes it's discarded as a hobby. But I think with things like this competition, you see that people actually are living in poetry day after day," Dawn said. "It's something that you can make a career out of and a life out of, and you can be super successful doing what you love doing."
🐖 Noblesville BBQ lovers rejoice. Blue Smoke BBQ opened Saturday at 610 Hannibal St. to give HamCo diners another option.
- The business started in Cicero with a tent and food truck before making the jump to brick and mortar.