RAIN — Week of August 17, 2026

CRAI News

Center for Rural AI Names Jason Strickland Head of Technology

Distrust: The Most Effective AI Operating Model

Ask Amy

I run cattle in eastern Montana. A company selling an AI monitoring collar wants two years of herd records to "train the model." Free during the trial, paid after. Worth it?    Cody in Montana

How exciting! I love it when technology can help solve problems in agriculture. Two years of data is significant, and I can see great benefit to you in having that kind of complete information. Just a thought if you do go through with it. Is there something you want to answer about your operation? Is a given protocol actually working? Can you compare two grazing areas? You might be able to gain insights into your herd you otherwise would not be able to see. That is two full year cycles of data!

I am not a lawyer, so take my advice accordingly. But here is what I would pin down before handing anything over.

What counts as herd data? Breed, weights, calving dates, treatment history, movement: all reasonable, and useful to you too. If they start asking for sale prices, genetics, or your financials, push back. That is not collar data.

Who owns the data? If you drop the product, or the company folds, you should retain ownership of your data. Get that in writing.

What is the cost after the trial? The per-head fee, the collar hardware, the minimum contract length, all of it in writing before the trial starts, not after you are already leaning on it.

These types of offers tend to gloss over this point. Your records are the training data for a product they plan to sell. That gives you more leverage, so it is fair to ask for good pricing locked in past the trial. Cody, you are not only a customer here. You are part of what makes the thing work.

Until next week, Amy

Every column starts with a reader question. Yours can be next: ruralai.org/ask-amy

Stories of the Week

Kentucky mother and daughter stand firm against data center; decline $26 million offer for 500 acres of family land

Scorecard — automatically removed when published
Workforce: 3.00
Agriculture: 2.00
Individual Weighted Score: 5.80
Holistic Score: 6.0
Base (mech/holistic avg): 5.90
AI Centrality: 3/3 (+3)
AI note: The story centers on an AI-driven data center project and the community conflict it causes, with AI explicitly cited as the reason for the land dispute.
Final: 8.90

Delsa Bare, 54, and her 83-year-old mother Ida Huddleston turned down more than $26 million for 500-plus acres in Mason County, Kentucky, after learning the buyer, believed to be Meta, wanted the land for an AI data center. Their refusal has stalled a 2,000-acre project.

The company had promised 400 jobs, $15 million for emergency services and $80 million in water system upgrades, and it is now holding back checks to other Maysville farmers who expected a windfall. NDAs have left local officials unable to brief constituents, and neighbors are suing neighbors.

Iowa academics launch tool to help localities weigh proposed data centers

Scorecard — automatically removed when published
Environment: 1.60
Broadband: 1.00
Education: 1.00
Individual Weighted Score: 3.60
Holistic Score: 6.0
Base (mech/holistic avg): 4.80
AI Centrality: 2/3 (+1)
AI note: The story is about data centers driven by AI/hyperscaler demand and the local impacts (water, energy, land use) of that growth, but the tool itself focuses on infrastructure and community decision-making rather than AI technology per se.
Final: 5.80

The University of Iowa's Hubbell Environmental Law Initiative and Tippie College of Business released the Iowa Data Center Decision Tool this month, a free question set covering water, energy, land use, taxation and emergency services. Iowa already hosts more than 100 data centers, with more hyperscalers planned.

Director Jennifer Terry notes 900 of Iowa's 1,000 communities are far too small to keep engineers and attorneys on hand before signing an agreement. A workbook version and a white paper on Iowa data center development are due later this year.

The data center industry's PR blitz Is backfiring

Scorecard — automatically removed when published
Workforce: 3.00
Environment: 1.60
Broadband: 1.00
Individual Weighted Score: 6.30
Holistic Score: 6.0
Base (mech/holistic avg): 6.15
AI Centrality: 1/3 (-1)
AI note: The story is about data center siting, PR, taxes, and community opposition, with AI compute demand as underlying context but not the explicit subject of debate (except a brief mention of an AI-analytics firm tracking county sentiment).
Tier: incidental-AI — ranked below all AI-central items
Final: 5.15

An update on the data center backlash covered in recent issues: the industry's counteroffensive is losing. A front group called North Carolina Connects, funded by the Data Center Coalition without disclosing it, has run TV and streaming ads while national opposition to nearby construction climbed to 61 percent, up 12 points since spring.

Ten North Carolina counties, 17 cities and the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians have passed moratoria. Analysts say developers are now shifting toward low-population counties in the Upper Midwest, Colorado, Wyoming and Alaska, so rural boards there should expect the pitch, and the NDA, soon.

Governors' Races are Being Increasingly Buffeted by The Toxic Politics of Data Centers

Scorecard — automatically removed when published
Environment: 1.60
Agriculture: 1.00
Broadband: 1.00
Individual Weighted Score: 3.60
Holistic Score: 6.0
Base (mech/holistic avg): 4.80
AI Centrality: 1/3 (-1)
AI note: The story is about the political and energy/water backlash against data centers, with AI mentioned only as the underlying demand driver rather than as the subject itself.
Tier: incidental-AI — ranked below all AI-central items
Final: 3.80

The AI buildout has become a governor's race issue in a dozen states. Arizona's Katie Hobbs won a three-year suspension of the state's data center sales tax exemption, New York's Kathy Hochul ordered a one-year ban on large facilities, and Illinois' JB Pritzker halted new exemptions until lawmakers set tougher standards.

In Texas, Gina Hinojosa is running ads in rural markets accusing Gov. Abbott of selling out ranchland and dwindling water supplies. Farmland loss, wells and electricity bills are now campaign issues, which gives rural officials leverage they did not have a year ago.