I would guess the 20 year 'tax break' (AKA the other taxpayers are footing the bill) is the real reason for the building. shell game

Meta built a data center in North Kansas City. I'm not sure details of their break (Mayor loves to hand out money), but power is likely cheaper, & def much greener (1/3 from wind farms in Western Kansas state last I checked).

"take advantage of a new Louisiana incentive program, established by Act 730, that offers qualifying projects a state and local sales and use tax rebate on the purchase or lease of data center equipment"

https://www.opportunitylouisiana.gov/news/meta-selects-north...

> AKA the other taxpayers are footing the bill

Curious as to how you reached this conclusion. No taxpayer funds are going towards construction or operation of the data center. The lack of tax revenue from Meta is nothing spent, and they're still going to be paying into the local economy. The energy infrastructure is going to be built by Entergy, who've projected it to cost customers ~$1 more or less per month.

As someone who lives here, this is one of the few times I agree with our government. We're one of the least competitive states in the country, our tech sector is almost non-existent. It's reasonable to offer what you can to attract business. I think Landry's LED efforts so far have been a respectable attempt at improving the state of things.