Country music superstar Brad Paisley is calling on his fans to help him wrangle a major controversy causing a stir in Music City.
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The “Whiskey Lullaby” singer took to Instagram, urging his over 2 million followers to sign a petition to stop the construction of a 69,000-square-foot data center just 50 yards from the Nashville Zoo. He told fans, “it’s not too late to stop it.”
“First of all, they don’t have the power to build this. They don’t have the water. It doesn’t belong there. It would be an enormous monstrosity, an absolute eyesore, and detract in every way from not only that zoo, but that area,” Paisley said in the video, which he jointly posted with The Nashville Zoo.
The 53-year-old also added that the zoo is “one of the top zoos in the world.”
“This can’t happen. Sign the petition and help stop the data center from going next to the @nashvillezoo,” Paisley added in the caption.
With Paisley’s Support, the Nashville Zoo’s Petition Has Garnered Over 394,000 Signatures
Meanwhile, Paisley’s video comes just days after the zoo created and promoted a petition on social media, which quickly gained national attention and amassed over 394,000 signatures (to include that of Nashville’s mayor, Freddie O’Connell).
“Data centers consume enormous amounts of electricity and water; straining power grids, depleting natural resources, and damaging our watershed,” the Nashville Zoo wrote in part. “With nothing more than the word of a profit-seeking developer, how are we to know this new data center will not lead to irreversible damage to the animals we exist to protect?”
In a follow-up post, the Nashville Zoo also revealed it is taking legal action in an effort to stop the data center from being built in the proposed site.
In its post, the zoo said the proposed data center might be much larger than originally stated. Planning documents show a second building over 202,000 square feet with a 40-megawatt capacity and an electrical substation, bringing the total to 50 megawatts… That’s also enough to power up to 50,000 homes.
“Because of these concerns, Nashville Zoo has taken its first legal step,” the zoo wrote. “Our Land Use Attorney and former Metro Codes Director, Bill Herbert, has filed a zoning appeal seeking to overturn the permits approved for the project.”
A Nashville resident, Paisley is active in his community. In 2020, he and his wife helped start The Store, a free, referral-based grocery store in Nashville that aims to fight food insecurity.