Before these projects, the acres in question produced about $25,000 a year. That is ranchland math. It does not build a high school, staff a fire station, or take weight off a homestead.
EdgeConneX won Cedar Creek over 535 other sites. A ten-year abatement was part of landing it. Building Bastrop County reports that even during that discount, the county and Bastrop ISD still receive more than $107 million+. The discount is the reason the campus is here. It is not a permanent exemption. When it ends, the full commercial value — phase one at $1.4 billion, full buildout above $5 billion+ — is what the roll taxes.
Tomorrow Begins Here publishes a separate ISD figure for that proposal: $15.5 million a year, $155 million over ten years, without the students who would otherwise spend it. Those two publications are not the same line item. This page shows both. It does not add them.
| Line | Published figure |
|---|---|
| Starting point, raw landBuilding Bastrop County | $25,000 a year |
| EdgeConneX during the abatementBuilding Bastrop County | $107 million+ to the county and ISD |
| EdgeConneX, ISD projectionTomorrow Begins Here | $15.5 million a year · $155 million over 10 years |
| Pacifico at the full rateBuilding Bastrop County | $20 million+ a year |
| Pacifico’s published shareBuilding Bastrop County | 30%+ of county revenue |
Annual property tax
Raw land, before
$25,000
Pacifico, full rate
$20 million+
Building Bastrop County. Raw land is the published starting point, about $25,000 a year. Pacifico is a different campus, published at more than $20 million a year after it withdrew its abatement. These are both annual lines. They are not one bill. A bar that is under about 2% of the longest bar is drawn slightly wider so it stays visible.
EdgeConneX investment
Phase 1
$1.4 billion
Full buildout
$5 billion+
Building Bastrop County. Phase one and the planned full campus. The abatement payment, more than $107 million to the county and ISD, covers a different window and is left in the table above.
Schools
The new taxable value arrives without a new enrollment class. Building Bastrop County’s framing is direct: the revenue can go to teacher pay, buildings, and technology, because it is not consumed by about 1,500 additional students the way a 1,000-home subdivision would require.
County services
Fire engines, EMS, and the county budget are funded by the levy. A campus that brings its own security and suppression adds a payer and not a new neighborhood of calls. Pacifico’s full-rate payment is published at more than 30%+ of county revenue from that project alone.
Homeowners
When more of the levy comes from a commercial asset, the same public services do not have to be carried only by houses. That is the relief. It is a change in who pays, not a coupon printed on one tax statement.
Pacifico stepped off the abatement
Pacifico Energy and BlackChamber Partners withdrew their Chapter 312 and JETI applications. Building Bastrop County reports the Cedar Creek campus will pay full property taxes: $20 million+ a year on a $2.2 billion project with 710 MW of on-site generation. That is the cleanest version of the argument. No discount period. A full commercial bill, and still almost no students, almost no daily traffic, and a potable draw published at 2,000 gallons a day.
EdgeConneX is the competitive version of the same idea. The abatement is what kept a $5 billion+ campus from landing at one of the other 535 sites. During the discount, the public entities still collect orders of magnitude more than the $25,000 the land paid before. After the discount, the county keeps the building.