OSU invites public to Innovation Park community meeting

The Innovation Foundation at Oklahoma State University is inviting the public to attend a community meeting from 5:30-6:30 p.m. Thursday, Jan. 23 at the Horticulture Education Center at the OSU Botanic Garden located at 3300 W. Sixth Ave. in Stillwater.

At the meeting, attendees will get updates from OSU on their vision for major updates to Innovation Park, the Student Farm, and Botanic Garden.

Notable items of the vision include:

A pedestrian bridge over Hwy 51 connecting the Botanic Garden to a new welcome center near the Student Farm.
A network of trails connecting Innovation Park, the Student Farm, and Botanic Garden.
Relocating OSU’s supercomputer to the park along with a carrier-neutral internet exchange point.
A drone testing and education center.
Wellness housing and fitness areas.
Renovations to the historic barn at the Student Farm.
An interactive, hands-on treewalk village at the Botanic Gardens.

A network of walking and biking trails are being proposed that would connect all three properties. The trails would also connect to multi-use paths at Western Road and 12th Avenue. – Images extracted from Innovation Foundation storybook

“At its core, the Innovation Park is intended to serve as a platform to share ideas, blur industries, and explore the next. Interdisciplinary multi-sector collaboration is a main focus area and is promoted through a series of collaboration centers that are strategically placed throughout the Park.”

The Innovation Foundation is seeking grant funding to bring their vision to life. Check out the Innovation Park storybook to see more conceptual drawings and renderings.

Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Day Community Celebration

The Stillwater community will celebrate the life and contributions of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. beginning at 6 p.m. Sunday, Jan. 19 at the Stillwater Community Center located at 315 W. 8th Ave.

Music will be performed by Connor Helm and the Mt. Zion Choir
Retired OSU Chief of Police, Leon Jones will be a guest speaker
Due to extreme cold the MLK Day Unity March on Monday has been canceled.

The Google data center in Mayes County is adorned with a mural bringing art to an industrial setting. See details at Google's Data Center Mural Project website – Photo by Google

Payne County Commissioners are next up on data center agreements

The Payne County Commissioners will meet at 9 a.m. on Tuesday instead of Monday because of Martin Luther King Day.

The most notable item on the agenda is discussion of the Local Development Act Tax Incentive Agreement with Kipper LLC, a subsidiary of an unnamed technology company who wishes to build a massive data center complex in Stillwater.

Commissioners will also possibly take action on a related resolution that would bring the County annual payments starting at $89,985 in year one and increasing to $121,286 in year twenty-five for a total of $2.69 million.

Payne County and the Payne County Health Department are the final taxing entities needed to approve the data project. Meridian Technology Center, Stillwater Public Schools, and the City of Stillwater have already approved the agreements.
According to the Tax Incentive District agreement, taxing entities have 60 days to approve or disapprove the TID.

🔍 Clues to who is behind Kipper LLC according to City leaders:

US-based Fortune 100 company
Leads in artificial intelligence (not Kipper AI)
Owner-operated facilities
Not a cryptocurrency mining operation

The short list of companies who could qualify are Meta (Facebook), Microsoft, Google, NVIDIA, Amazon, and Apple.

One Big Clue: datacenters.com maintains a list of all data centers located in Oklahoma. Google is the only company on that list that could meet the above qualifications.

Google has owned and operated a massive data center complex in Mayes County near Pryor, Oklahoma, since 2007.
According to Google, they have invested over $3 million in local schools and nonprofits in Mayes County since 2011.

☀️ Related: A Dallas firm plans to build another solar farm for Pryor’s Google Data Center. From OK ENERGY TODAY's story:

The energy generated by the solar portfolio is delivered under firm transmission service to the Grand River Dam Authority (“GRDA”). GRDA plans to utilize the clean energy produced by the projects to support operations at Google’s data center.

GRDA is Oklahoma's largest public power utility which provides electricity to Stillwater Utilities. However, OG&E will be the provider of high-voltage electricity for the Stillwater data center.

Acting SPS Superintendent Janet Vinson announces retirement

News Press reporter, Jessica Marshall has the scoop on Stillwater Public Schools acting Superintendent retiring after the spring school semester. Vinson started her education career in 1991.