Data centers classified as communications service exchanges are permitted only in specified zoning districts, conditional in certain agricultural, professional-office, and public/semi-public districts, and prohibited in districts not listed. Any use not listed as permitted or conditional is prohibited, although the Planning Director may classify a questionable use as similar to a listed use. Unlisted uses are considered prohibited.

A communications service exchange that is a conditional use requires Board of Zoning Appeals approval before operation. The BZA must hold a public hearing, may impose conditions or require recorded commitments, and must reauthorize any expansion or enlargement. Conditional uses require BZA approval and may not be expanded without reauthorization.

Development in site-development-plan districts requires an approved site development plan before a structure may be erected, moved, occupied, added to, or before land may be used. The process can require Plan Commission or Hearing Examiner review and a public hearing. No structure or land use is allowed without an approved site development plan.

Properties in the Joint District Plan Review overlay remain subject to underlying zoning and also require Joint District Plan Commission site-development-plan review and approval. The Joint District Plan Commission exercises site-development-plan review authority.

A zoning map amendment may be required if the proposed data center is not allowed in the existing district. Rezoning involves Plan Commission review and recommendation, public-hearing procedures, and a final vote by the applicable legislative body. Written commitments must be recorded within 90 days after adoption or the rezoning becomes void. Rezoning requires Plan Commission and legislative-body action.

An Improvement Location Permit is required before regulated construction, installation, occupancy, a change of use, or an increase in use intensity begins. For most nonresidential structures exceeding 120 square feet or having a permanent foundation, a Zoning Compliance Certificate is required before any building permit. Permits expire if work has not begun within 3 years or been completed within 7 years after a complete application is filed. Construction and changes in use require an Improvement Location Permit.

A data center may not be occupied or used until required inspections are completed and the Chief Code Enforcement Officer issues a Certificate of Occupancy. Occupancy requires a Certificate of Occupancy.

For a new telecommunications facility, the applicant must provide verification from an Indiana-licensed professional engineer that proposed antennas cannot be accommodated at existing or approved facilities or alternative structures within a 2-mile radius because of functionality, technical feasibility, or economic burden. New support structures must also be designed to accommodate additional users at specified tower-height intervals. New telecommunications facilities require an engineering justification and collocation capacity.

New telecommunications facilities generally require a minimum 50-foot side and rear setback, a front setback under the underlying district, and a 250-foot separation from residentially zoned property. Facilities also require an 8-foot security fence, with opaque fencing in commercial and public/semi-public districts, and evergreen screening around the fence except in agricultural districts. Telecommunications facilities have additional setbacks, fencing, and landscape-screening requirements.

A data processing or call-center use requires off-street parking at a minimum rate of one space per 200 square feet of gross floor area. Parking areas must satisfy paving, drainage, marking, maneuvering, setback, landscaping, and accessibility requirements; parking lots with 25 or more spaces require interior landscaped areas. Data processing and call centers have a parking ratio of one space per 200 square feet.

Commercial, public/semi-public, industrial, and multifamily data-center sites are subject to landscaping requirements for parking-frontage areas, parking-lot interiors, front setbacks, building perimeters, and tall freestanding signs. Required landscaping must be installed before a permanent Certificate of Occupancy, unless installation is delayed for up to 9 months with a financial guarantee equal to 125% of the installation cost. Landscaping must generally be installed before permanent occupancy.

Where a data center is in a more intensive district next to a less intensive district, a buffer yard is required on the data-center property. Buffer Types A, B, and C add specified widths beyond ordinary setbacks and require fencing, berms, evergreen screening, or landscaping points. More intensive zoning next to less intensive zoning triggers buffer-yard requirements.

Commercial, public/semi-public, and industrial districts generally require public water and sewer service, along with adequate fire-fighting water capacity. In the Wellfield Protection Overlay, most development must connect to public sewer, dry wells are prohibited, and storage or transfer areas for potential groundwater contaminants must contain at least 110% of their capacity. Wellfield areas impose public-sewer and containment requirements.

In the Airport Hazard Overlay, structures may not exceed Federal Aviation Regulations Part 77 height limits, and development may not create electrical interference, pilot-disorienting lighting, glare, visibility impairment, or other aircraft hazards. Airport-overlay development is subject to Part 77 height and safety restrictions.

Data-center construction or alteration in a special flood hazard area or 500-year floodplain requires a Floodplain Development Permit and compliance with floodplain standards. New or substantially improved nonresidential structures generally must be elevated to or floodproofed at least to the Flood Protection Grade, defined as two feet above the base flood elevation, with flood-resistant materials, anchoring, protected utilities, and required certifications. Floodplain development requires a separate permit and flood-protection measures.

New buildings and other development are prohibited in identified regulatory floodways, subject to listed exceptions such as certain pre-existing buildings, utilities, public infrastructure, nature preserves, marinas, mineral extraction, and flood-mitigation projects. Exempt or otherwise approvable projects generally require Indiana Department of Natural Resources approval before local action. Floodway development is generally prohibited and may require IDNR approval.

If a data center is located in an industrial district, its operation must comply with limits on smoke and particulate matter, electrical disturbance, fire and explosive hazards, noise, odor, vibration, glare, heat, toxic or noxious materials, waste, and water pollutants. Industrial uses must meet operational nuisance and environmental controls.

If a data center is developed through a Planned Unit Development, no use is granted by right and all proposed uses and development standards require approval through the PUD process. The process includes Preliminary and Final Plan review, public hearings, legislative-body action, and recorded development standards. A Preliminary Plan expires if a Final Plan application is not filed within 1 year, if the Final Plan is not approved within 3 years, or, for phased projects, if 5 years elapses between approved Final Plans. PUDs provide no uses by right and impose approval and expiration requirements.

The ordinance defines a “communications service exchange” to include facilities housing computer systems and related equipment dedicated to processing data, providing a zoning category that can cover data centers.

Telecommunications facilities are permitted uses in the Commercial: Community (CC), Commercial: Regional (CR), and all Industrial zoning districts, allowing qualifying facilities in those districts without a conditional-use approval.

Telecommunications facilities are conditional uses in the Commercial: Professional Office (CO), Public/Semi-Public (P), and all Agricultural zoning districts, allowing qualifying facilities to seek approval through the Board of Zoning Appeals rather than being prohibited.

Data processing and call-center uses are permitted in the Downtown Center (CD), Downtown Support (CDS), Regional Center (CR), Light Industrial (I1), and General Industrial (I2) districts.

A new telecommunications facility may be approved when a licensed Indiana professional engineer verifies that existing or approved facilities or alternative structures within two miles cannot accommodate the proposed antennas because of functionality, technical feasibility, or economic burden.

New antennas placed on existing support structures or previously approved alternative structures are exempt from the telecommunications-facility chapter and zoning-compliance-certificate requirement unless the work is a substantial modification; prior approvals still apply.

Replacing an existing telecommunications facility at the same location with a substantially similar, same-size, or smaller facility is permitted and exempt from Article 11 nonconformity requirements and the zoning-compliance-certificate requirement, subject to prior approvals.

Lawfully established uses, structures, lots, signs, and site features that later become inconsistent because of a zoning ordinance or map change receive legal-nonconforming status and may continue to the extent they existed when the change occurred.

Legal nonconforming structures may receive ordinary repairs and may be restored after damage from fire, flood, another natural disaster, criminal act, or government action, provided restoration does not increase the prior nonconformity.

A change of use in a legal nonconforming structure does not by itself eliminate the structure's legal-nonconforming status, although the replacement use must comply with the ordinance or applicable approval.