Tier III AI Data Center, Lewiston, Maine

Lewiston said no. On December 16, 2025 the city council in Lewiston, in Androscoggin County, Maine, voted unanimously against MillCompute LLC's Tier III AI data center, planned for Bates Mill No. 3, the historic mill building in the middle of town, holding 85,000 square feet of servers alongside office and innovation space for technology companies.

Much of the objection was to the money. The deal included a 20 year tax increment financing agreement that would have returned 90 percent of the project's taxes to the developer for ten years, then 85 percent for the following decade. City administrator Bryan Kaenrath, who had supported the project for the tax revenue, had said beforehand it would bring the city just under $800,000 in tax revenue and 20 to 30 jobs.

"This had the potential for being a great project," Ward 6 council member David Chittim said. "It may still have, but not within the time frames and the constraints that have been imposed on it." Hunter Bouchard, the sophomore class president at Lewiston High School, told the council he had talked to as many classmates as he could and all of them were against it: "I want to remind you who they are. These are not just high school students; this is the next generation. They are going to be affected by this change 10 and 20 years down the line."

After the vote, Kaenrath said future proposals would have to be looked at "very carefully": "There are many other options for development in these buildings. Making them financially feasible is the biggest challenge." No one from MillCompute LLC spoke at the meeting, and the plans, submitted by the mill building's owner, had been public for only a week. A memo to council members said the company's team included "local leadership and experts from across the country in data center construction, operation, and finance," without naming them.