Warren County, MS Zoning: The AWS Data Center Case Study

The Warren County hub already tells you unincorporated land outside Vicksburg has no zoning ordinance and has opted out of the statewide building code. In November 2025, that abstract fact turned into a concrete, high-dollar example: Amazon Web Services announced a $3 billion-plus data-center campus, "Project Steamboat," on unincorporated land near Vicksburg. Here's exactly how a project of that scale gets approved -- and challenged -- in a county with no zoning map to consult.

This page covers what's specific to Warren County. For the general explanation, see the national guide.

Project Steamboat: a $3 billion data center on unincorporated, unzoned land

In November 2025, Governor Tate Reeves and the Vicksburg-Warren Economic Development Partnership announced that Amazon Web Services would build a data-center campus -- publicly referred to during planning as "Project Steamboat" -- on unincorporated Warren County land just outside Vicksburg. The site sits off Highway 61 South, with its entrance under construction on Old Cain Ridge Road and its main campus about a quarter mile west of Dana Road Elementary School. At a reported $3 billion capital investment, it's described as the largest single investment in Warren County's history, with an expected 200 direct high-tech jobs and roughly 500 additional indirect jobs regionally.

The reason this project belongs on a dedicated Warren County zoning page, rather than just as a line in the county hub, is what it demonstrates concretely: because the site is in unincorporated Warren County -- outside Vicksburg's city limits, where the county's own zoning ordinance would apply -- the project did not go through a zoning approval process, a rezoning request, or a use-variance hearing at all. There was no zoning map to consult because none exists for that land. Instead, the project moved forward through the Warren County Building Permit Office's development-permit process and a package of financial agreements the Board of Supervisors approved directly.

What actually gets a project like this approved, if not zoning

The Board of Supervisors' own agenda actions, reported by the Vicksburg Post, show what does the work that a zoning process would otherwise do: a fee-in-lieu-of-taxes agreement -- a mechanism available under Mississippi law for projects with a minimum capital investment above $60 million -- guaranteeing at least $2.5 billion in investment and a minimum of 100 direct jobs sustained over five years; a $20 million loan agreement with the Mississippi Development Authority; approval of a right-of-way request; and an engineering contract with Neel-Schaffer for road improvements tied to the project. The Vicksburg Warren School District is projected to receive substantial annual property-tax-equivalent revenue through the fee-in-lieu arrangement even though the project itself doesn't pay standard ad valorem property taxes on the improvements.

Separately, Entergy Mississippi announced roughly $1.2 billion in local grid modernization tied to serving the project's power demand, including construction of a new 754-megawatt natural-gas power plant on the site of the decommissioned Baxter Wilson plant. None of this required a zoning hearing either -- it runs through the Mississippi Public Service Commission's utility-regulation process, a separate track entirely from county land-use approval.

Neighbor concerns, and how they surfaced without a zoning hearing

A zoned county typically gives nearby property owners a formal venue -- a public zoning-board or variance hearing -- to raise concerns about a large industrial-scale project before it's approved. Unincorporated Warren County doesn't have that mechanism, so concerns have surfaced instead directly at Board of Supervisors meetings: resident Lily Pierson has raised heat, noise, and generator-exhaust concerns from the data center directly to the Board, and a separate group of residents held a peaceful protest in downtown Vicksburg tied to a nationwide "AI Data Center National Day of Protest," citing concerns about heat waste, noise, light pollution, and electromagnetic-frequency discharge from the facility.

For a buyer evaluating land anywhere near the Highway 61 South / Old Cain Ridge Road corridor, or considering how Warren County might handle a future large-scale project near a different parcel, the practical lesson is this: don't expect a zoning notice or public hearing to be your early-warning system the way it might be in a zoned county. Instead, Board of Supervisors meeting agendas, published in advance and open to the public, are the closest equivalent -- and are worth monitoring directly if a nearby large project could affect your land's noise, traffic, or utility-service environment.

Zoning in Warren County, Mississippi: What "No Zoning" Looked Like in Practice

Project Steamboat: a $3 billion data center on unincorporated, unzoned land

What actually gets a project like this approved, if not zoning

Neighbor concerns, and how they surfaced without a zoning hearing

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