399 acres in Luling could be zoned for heavy industry before anyone has said what's coming
The Planning & Zoning Commission takes up the Esperanza rezoning again on Dec. 3. In October it voted 7–0 to recommend it, and no one from the public spoke. This time we're asking neighbors to come and ask for denial, or at the least for the heavy-industrial part to come out.
Public hearing
Zoning change
- Case
- 2026-12-R (Ord. 2026-0340)
- Applicant
- Esperanza Land, LLC
- Area
- About 1,088 acres of Esperanza Plantation, Luling
- Request
- C-3 commercial to M-1 light industrial (689 ac) and M-2 heavy industrial (399 ac)
- Hearing
- Thursday, Dec. 3, 6 p.m. (expected; not yet on the posted agenda)
- Place
- Council Chambers, St. Charles Parish Courthouse, 15045 River Road, Hahnville, LA
Come to the hearing and speak
Ask the Commission to recommend denial, or at the least to strike the 399 acres of M-2 heavy industrial.
The date and room come from the parish's meeting calendar. The Commission's rules set a 6 p.m. start, and every one of its meetings since January 2025 has started at 6, but the parish website's calendar lists this one at 5. We're checking, and we'll update this page when the agenda posts. Speaking rules are from the Commission's Rules for Regular Meetings: each person may speak once per case, for up to three minutes.
- Get there a few minutes before 6 and sign in if there's a sheet. Bring a neighbor.
- When you're called, give your name and address for the record.
- Make one point from the list below, and keep to the rezoning. You have three minutes.
- Add a sentence on why it matters to you: where you live, how your street drains, what you fish.
- If the Commission won't deny it, ask it to hold the request until there's a drainage study for all 1,088 acres and an answer on who pays for the pump station at LA 3127.
What's being decided
Esperanza Land, LLC asks the parish to rezone about 1,088 acres of Esperanza Plantation, between LA 3127 and I-310, from Highway Commercial (C-3) to industrial: 689 acres of M-1 light industrial and 399 acres of M-2 heavy industrial. The same ordinance changes the parish's Future Land Use Map to Industrial and Heavy Industrial to match.
Ordinance 2026-0340, Sec. III; Planning Department Staff Report, case 2026-12-R
The Planning & Zoning Commission holds a public hearing and makes a recommendation. The Parish Council makes the decision. In October the Commission voted 7–0 to recommend the rezoning, and no member of the public spoke. On Oct. 26, at the administration's request, the Council voted 9–0 to postpone the ordinance indefinitely and send it back to the Commission.
Staff Report, "Department Recommendation"; Commission minutes, 10/8/2026; postponed Ordinance 2026-0340 (vote); Council meeting video, 10/26/2026 (referral)
What 399 acres of M-2 would allow
M-2 allows every M-1 use, plus
- Refining and chemical processing
- Fuel handling and storage
- Energy generation
- Concrete plants
- Junkyards
- Data centers with their own power plants
Staff Report, criterion 3, listing the district's uses
M-1 already allows office parks, warehousing, light processing and manufacturing, and data centers. M-2 is what adds the heavy end. Once land is zoned, a permitted use doesn't need another Council vote, and the zoning stays with the land if it's sold.
Staff Report, criterion 3 (district use lists); the last sentence is our reading of how zoning works
The developer's own documents describe light industry
The developer's drainage study covers 515.6 acres "of proposed commercial/light industrial development." That's about half the site, and none of it is studied as heavy industry.
Drainage Impact Study, Westwood, 9/30/2026, §2.1
The draft traffic study models manufacturing on 99.5 acres.
Draft Traffic Impact Study, 10/1/2026, PDF p. 8
The Parish President's letter backing the site for state FastSites money called it "immediately viable for large-scale logistics, commercial, and light industrial development," supporting "economic diversification beyond traditional heavy industrial uses." That's a case for M-1 at most, not 399 acres of M-2.
Parish President's letter of support to the LED FastSites committee
Where the data-center talk comes from
Esperanza's FastSites application told the State the site is "uniquely situated" given "the surge of AI related developments, and the corresponding need for substantial power sources."
Esperanza Land FastSites application, 12/15/2025, p. 2
On April 6, the night the Council took up a moratorium on new data centers, the applicant sent the Parish President and every Councilmember a letter on Esperanza Land letterhead for the meeting record. It asked the Council to drop the moratorium, which it said would send "a negative signal to investors and developers," and to regulate data centers through zoning instead. The letter doesn't mention the Esperanza site or any project. The moratorium failed 3–5.
Esperanza Land letter to the Parish President and Council, 4/6/2026, produced under request PRR-521; Staff Report, "Applicant / Property Owner"; St. Charles Herald-Guide, 4/7/2026 (vote)
In June the Council adopted data-center rules instead. They allow data centers in M-1 and M-2, and only M-2 allows one with its own power plant.
St. Charles Herald-Guide, 6/3/2026; Staff Report, criterion 3 (district use lists)
That's why some neighbors expect a data center here. No document names one, and nobody has named a user for the 399 acres. What the record shows is a site pitched to power-hungry users, and a request for the one district where a data center could bring its own power plant.
What the record doesn't answer
No document in the parish's record names a buyer, tenant or planned use for the 399 acres of M-2. A search of state business and environmental filings and the parish land-records index turned up none either.
Parish records produced under request PRR-521; Secretary of State, Board of Ethics, LDEQ, LED and Clerk of Court index, searched 11/1/2026
The parish's Master Drainage Plan calls for a $10,993,800 pump station at LA 3127 when this basin develops. The developer's drainage study doesn't mention it. We found no line for it in the 2027 proposed budget or this year's capital project reports.
West Bank Master Drainage Plan, Luling Executive Summary, p. 3 (3/6/2023); 2027 proposed budget and capital reports, searched 11/3/2026
On Sept. 3 the parish's director of economic development wrote to a Councilmember that "the parish is not contributing a single dollar." Does that include the pump station?
Email, Director of Economic Development and Tourism, 9/3/2026 (PRR-521)
For sewer, the developer told the State "no line exists today"; the nearest lift station with capacity is 4,500 feet away. Excess capacity on the water line is "TBD."
FastSites application, corrected budget, pp. 3–4
How the Commission decides
Under the parish's zoning ordinance, the developer has to give "reasonable factual proof" that at least two of three criteria are met:
- It fits the parish's Future Land Use Map. Staff found it does not. The map shows wetlands, homes, commercial and a town center here.
- Conditions have changed so that the current zoning no longer allows reasonable use of the land. Staff found this met.
- The new uses won't clash with the neighborhood or overburden public facilities. Staff found this met, in a finding that doesn't discuss drainage, water or sewer.
Zoning Ordinance, Appendix A, Sec. XV.D, quoted in the Staff Report with staff's findings
With the first criterion not met, everything rides on the second and third. Commissioners need a reason they can write down. "I don't want this" doesn't give them one. "Where's the proof on drainage?" does.
Lot 12, the last time
Lot 12 is one of the four lots in this rezoning. The last time this tract was proposed for development, in 2007, EPA warned that its wetlands "provide floodwater storage." The State withdrew the application when the developer didn't supply the information it asked for, and fined the then-owner for dredging and clearing done without a permit.
EPA Region 6 comment, 12/12/2007; coastal use permit files P20070461 (withdrawn 7/24/2008) and P20090014 (2/9/2009)
What to say
Pick one point. If several of us come, each taking a different one keeps us from repeating each other.
- Half a drainage study. "The developer's drainage study covers 515 of the 1,088 acres as light industry. Not one acre is studied as heavy industry."
- The pump station. "The parish's own drainage plan says this basin needs a $10,993,800 pump station at Highway 3127 when it develops. Who pays, and when?"
- Sewer and water. "The developer told the State 'no line exists today' for sewer, and that water-line capacity is 'TBD.'"
- Lot 12's wetlands. "In 2007 EPA wrote that this land's wetlands 'provide floodwater storage.' What's changed?"
- Light industry was the pitch. "The Parish President told the State this site was for 'logistics, commercial, and light industrial development.' That's a case for M-1 at most, not 399 acres of M-2."
- No end user. "You can't judge whether the uses will overburden our infrastructure when nobody will say what the uses are."
A simple version, if you want one:
My name is ___ and I live at ___. I'm asking the Commission to recommend denial of Case 2026-12-R. The developer's drainage study covers only 515 of the 1,088 acres, and none of it as heavy industry. The parish's own drainage plan says this basin needs a nearly $11 million pump station at Highway 3127, and nobody has said who pays for it. I [live / drive / fish / have family] ___. Until there's proof this won't overburden drainage, the criteria aren't met. Thank you.
Keep it solid
People opposing this have already been accused of spreading false information. Stick to what the record shows:
- Don't call it a data center. No user has been named. It's accurate to say the applicant pitched the site to the State for AI power needs, wrote the Council against a data-center moratorium, and is asking for the only district that allows a data center with its own power plant.
- Don't call it a spot zone. Staff's written report says it isn't one. Say staff found it doesn't fit the Future Land Use Map.
- Don't say there's no drainage study. There is one. It covers about half the site.
We're not against the Parkway extension or the jobs. We're asking the parish to do this in the right order: a named use and a drainage plan before heavy-industrial zoning.
How we got here
- The parish receives the rezoning application.
- First notice of the Commission hearing runs in the Herald-Guide.
- The Commission votes 7–0 to recommend approval. No member of the public speaks.
- The ordinance is introduced at the Council as a supplemental agenda item.
- At the administration's request, the Council votes 9–0 to postpone it indefinitely and send it back to the Commission.
- The Commission's hearing (expected; not yet on a posted agenda).
Staff Report; Commission minutes, 10/8/2026; Council Secretary's email, 10/26/2026; postponed Ordinance 2026-0340
Can't come? Write to the Commission
Send a short comment before Dec. 3. Use one point from this page, in your own words.
Email it to the Planning & Zoning Department, which staffs the Commission; the address below is the one the parish lists for Commission agendas. Or mail it to the Department of Planning & Zoning, P.O. Box 302, Hahnville, LA 70057. Address it to the Commission, give the case number, and ask that it go to every Commissioner and into the hearing record. You can copy Councilmember Walter Pilié, the Council's member on the Commission, at [email protected]. The Commission's rules say the Chairman "may" read written comments at the hearing, so coming in person still counts most. We're confirming with the department that this is the right address and when comments need to arrive.
Other fights we're tracking
| Campaign | Decided by | Status | What you can do | As of |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| GNOTS barge fleetLuling | U.S. Army Corps of EngineersMVN-2026-00154-EDM | Comment period closed April 7, 2026; Corps decision pending | Get an email when the Corps decides or a new comment period opens. | |
| IMTT St. Rose expansionSt. Rose | LDEQPermit 2520-00033-V16; Activity PER20200009 | LDEQ issued the air permit Aug. 18, 2026; a court challenge is pending | Nothing to file now | |
| Lapis Lake Salvador CO2 storageLake Salvador | LDENR Office of Coastal Management; U.S. Army Corps of EngineersCUP P20240989; MVN-2025-00066-EMM | Comment periods closed April 2025; permit decisions not confirmed | Nothing to file now | |
| Waterford 5 & 6 gas plantsKillona | LDEQAI 248424; 0520-00190-V0; PSD-LA-865 | LDEQ issued the air permits Oct. 2, 2026 | Get an email if a new comment period opens or the Commission rules on Unit 6. | |
| Libra CO2 storageSt. Charles Parish | Proposed | Nothing to file now | ||
| IMTT water discharge permitSt. Rose | LDEQPermit LA0075833; Activity PER20240003 | LDEQ issued the permit modification Sept. 28, 2026 | Nothing to file now |
To: [email protected]
Subject: Case 2026-12-R / Ordinance 2026-0340: please recommend denial