The 120-day freeze on new data center construction that Hillsboro's City Council approved July 27 could mark a turning point for Beaverton School District families watching their schools absorb millions in budget cuts while tech companies collect hundreds of millions in property tax breaks next door.

Hillsboro became the first Oregon city to enact such a moratorium when the council voted unanimously at a special meeting, called with roughly 20 hours' public notice, to adopt Resolution No. 2932.

About 50 residents attended in person and roughly 30 gave public testimony. The measure bars the city from accepting new data center or battery energy storage system applications and took effect immediately.

BSD leaders have said the data center boom in neighboring Hillsboro is driving up land prices and straining schools across Washington County, according to Patch reporting on July 27.

The district is navigating a structural deficit projected to grow from $20 million in the current year to more than $70 million by 2029, with its local option levy facing a $5.08 million shortfall for 2026-27.

The numbers behind the moratorium are stark.

Data center development has consumed Hillsboro's industrial land at more than double the pace the city's own 2021 analysis projected over 20 years. Hillsboro Herald editor Dirk Knudsen estimates the city's annual data center tax giveaways at $117 million to $125 million.

Statewide, Oregon school districts collectively lost $275 million to property tax abatements in 2024, more than double the $125 million lost in 2019, according to a Good Jobs First report cited by the Oregon Capital Chronicle.

Dr. Tammy Carpenter, a former BSD school board member and the nominee for Oregon House District 27, is among the plaintiffs in a June 22 lawsuit challenging 17 enterprise zone applications Hillsboro and Washington County approved in March and April. "I want the government to invest in schools, not data centers," Carpenter said in a 1000 Friends of Oregon press release on June 22 announcing the suit. "On the school board, I saw the impact of giving tax breaks to corporations instead of investing that money in local public schools."

Carpenter, along with Hillsboro City Councilor Kipperlyn Sinclair and resident Myrna Munoz, launched a Washington County petition that gathered more than 5,000 signatures calling for the moratorium. The Oregon Education Association and 1000 Friends of Oregon also joined the lawsuit.

The state Legislature had already passed House Bill 4084 earlier in 2026, imposing a one-year statewide moratorium on Standard Enterprise Zone tax breaks for data centers effective June 6.

The lawsuit alleges Hillsboro rushed to approve the 17 applications before that state law took effect, offering in some cases 25 years of back-to-back property tax waivers.

At Monday's meeting, Hillsboro Councilor Olivia Alcaire said data centers hurt working families because they do not create the kind of union jobs that support long-term community investment.

The top 11 tech company-owned data centers in Hillsboro employ an average of about 26 full-time workers each while receiving roughly $7.6 million apiece in annual property tax breaks, according to the Oregon Capital Chronicle.

One BSD school sits especially close to the issue. The Beaverton Academy of Science and Engineering, with nearly 900 students, is located approximately 120 feet from a proposed data center site at 10500 NE Walker Road in Hillsboro.

The moratorium runs 120 calendar days from July 27, expiring around late November unless the council extends or repeals it.

During that window, city staff will commission studies on how much land, power, and water data centers have consumed and will weigh impacts on residents that were never part of the city's original approval criteria.