Residents and environmental groups came to San José City Hall on Aug. 18 with a simple request: Wait.
We wanted the City Council to honor longstanding commitments to protect the surrounding open space permanently. We also wanted the city to explain the implications of rezoning 35 acres at IBM Almaden from site-specific Planned Development to Industrial Park.
We are not opposed to new uses or greater flexibility on the developed 35 acres. The IBM research center cannot remain frozen in time. But flexibility should not mean a blank check. Whatever comes next should be disclosed, reviewed under CEQA and shaped by meaningful public input.
We asked San José to finish its data-center standards and examine the effects of SB 131, a 2025 state law, before changing the zoning.
Councilmembers Kamei and Campos took these concerns to heart. Kamei sought a two-week delay, while Campos elicited staff’s acknowledgment that SB 131 could eliminate CEQA review for some uses.
District 10 Councilmember George Casey refused to wait. “Community input is not going to actually change anything,” he said.
That sentence should concern all of us. And that is exactly why CEQA matters.
CEQA, the California Environmental Quality Act, compels the city to be transparent. Before approving a project, it must analyze and disclose environmental impacts, consider safer alternatives, require feasible mitigation and give the public a chance to be heard.
But CEQA review at IBM Almaden is no longer assured.
SB 131 exempts qualifying “advanced manufacturing” projects from CEQA when they are built on industrially zoned land. By rezoning IBM Almaden to Industrial Park, San José has rendered the site vulnerable to SB 131. A future project that qualifies as advanced manufacturing could now claim the exemption. City staff acknowledged as much.
“Advanced manufacturing” sounds clean and modern. But its definition is extraordinarily broad. California has applied it to rare-earth processing, metal forging and recycling, biofuel refining, biopharmaceutical production, and aerospace and defense manufacturing.
At Almaden, such operations could bring hazardous materials, air pollution, wastewater, truck traffic, noise, light pollution, and enormous water and energy demands. Yet if SB 131 applies, there would be no environmental impact report examining those risks, alternatives or cumulative harm, no responses to public comments and no CEQA requirement to reduce significant impacts.
San José should make a simple commitment: No project at IBM Almaden should move forward without early public disclosure, meaningful community participation and project-specific environmental analysis. The city should also adopt enforceable data-center standards and permanently protect the surrounding open space before the next proposal arrives.
Community input must mean more than letting people speak after nothing can change.
Pandora’s box is now open. Pay attention to what happens next at IBM Almaden.
Shani Kleinhaus, Ph.D., is the environmental advocate for the Santa Clara Valley Bird Alliance.
