County commissioner says Granbury officials mislead public about data center
Hood County Commissioner Nannette Samuelson has accused the Granbury city manager and other city officials of deception and misrepresenting facts concerning power a plant designed for a future data center on over 2,000 acres annexed by the city in January.
Samuelson, who has been critical of a growing number of proposed data centers in her precinct, said during a specially-called commissioners court meeting Tuesday afternoon that the county received documents in June 2025 from Granbury’s economic development department describing the power plant project, called Project Horizon (now Project Patriot), from Dallas-based Bilateral Energy LLC.
In July, Bilateral Energy received a permit from the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality to build the power plant.
As she spoke, Samuelson displayed the documents on the screen.
“I put this agenda item on here because the public needs to know the sequence of events regarding Project Patriot,” she said.
She pointed to wording found in the document, “Bilateral Energy, powering the future of Granbury, a data center campus and power generation development.”
On April 7, the council voted to rezone roughly 2,000 acres that straddle Meadow Wood Road, south of U.S. 377 and north of Paluxy Highway to allow industrial development, which includes power plants and data centers. During that meeting City Manager Chris Coffman and Mayor Jim Jarratt denied knowing about Bilateral Energy’s plans before the land was annexed.
When asked about Samuelson’s accusations, Coffman said in a text message to the Star-Telegram, “As you know, this matter is under litigation and no comments are advised by legal counsel.”
The city manager, mayor and council members are named in an April 6 lawsuit in which several residents made allegations similar to Samuelson’s. The lawsuit seeks a permanent injunction and a temporary restraining order against the city of Granbury. The suit is also calling for the annexation to be reversed.
The suit alleges that Granbury “willfully evaded” providing documents in public records requests even though Attorney General Ken Paxton ordered Granbury to do so if the documents weren’t confidential.
The suit also claimed that Jarratt, Coffman, Assistant City Manager Michael Ross, and the City Council broke quorum requirements when they took a tour of a Dallas data center in early January with Hood County commissioners Kevin Andrews and Jack Wilson.
According to Samuelson, Granbury officials knew about the proposal to build the power plant and data center in June 2025.
Samuelson said Project Patriot was on the July 8 Commissioners Court agenda, and it was mentioned during several meetings before a Jan. 6 Granbury City Council meeting, when there was a vote to annex the 2,100 acres of the former Knox Ranch.
Samuelson described attending the City Council meeting, where officials repeatedly said they had no knowledge about development plans for the former Knox Ranch property.
“I was floored,” she said.
Coffman said during the meeting that no project had come before the council.
Samuelson called that a misleading statement.
“For him to say he didn’t know where Project Patriot was or what it was is inconsistent with the facts,” she said.
Samuelson said she did Google searches and easily found information about Bilateral Energy and its director, Daniel Wong.
Samuelson also stated that the city manager said during the meeting that he didn’t know who Wong was or which company he was associated with.
“Is this incompetence or purposeful deception on the part of the city attorney and the city manager?” Samuelson said.
She said the public knew about Project Patriot as well as the commissioners.
“I cannot sit by and watch a government employee and elected officials who are supposed to be working for the public mislead their constituents,” she said.