Michigan Township Tables Microsoft Data Center After Public Outcry

Tabling the decision gives Gaines Township opponents their most durable asset so far: time. The planning commission's Wednesday vote follows a public hearing that stretched for hours, with residents raising water depletion and grid strain as their central objections. But the procedural reality is that a deferral forces Microsoft to re-engage the process, not abandon it. The legislative track — a proposed one-year statewide moratorium on new data centers — is the only mechanism that could actually interrupt that cycle. Without it, the planning commission will eventually be required to…