The claim
Big Tech should have bonded for the road
“Big Tech should have bonded for that road from the beginning.”
Seen: Eagle Mountain City Tax Referendum Facebook group, August 2026.
True as far as it goes, and it leaves out something that changes the picture.
A fair criticism with a real fact behind it, the council did cut what commercial builders pay toward roads. It ends with the data center funding the whole project anyway.
The numbers
What’s true
On February 18, 2025 the council voted unanimously, Gray among them, to partially suspend the transportation impact fee for nonresidential development, and removed the restaurant carve-out at every building size. The city chose to charge commercial building less toward roads, and that is the strongest fact available to anyone arguing large employers under-contributed.
What it leaves out
The framing assumes a bond was available and refused. Utah cities cannot set a separate tax rate for data centers, and a councilmember told the August 6 hearing the city already charges the maximum impact fees state law allows. What the city got instead was QTS funding the full cost of the widening, and declining incentives it had already been granted on its next two buildings, more than a bond would have guaranteed on this particular road.
Where this comes from
Every finding here is drawn from an open-meeting recording or a published document. Check it yourself.
Read more on this site
More checks on roads & impact fees
- Not accurateA $5.5 million gift was spent on a road
- Not accurateNo bond was required for Pony Express Parkway
- MisleadingThirty years of impact fees for Pony Express
- Accurate, but incompleteDevelopers are made to bond for roads
Checked August 21, 2026. Nothing goes on the fact-check list unless an open-meeting recording or a published document can settle it: the rules. Spot a mistake? civicrollcall@gmail.com