# AG Opinion 2023-060 and County Authority Over Data Centers Arkansas Attorney General **Opinion No. 2023-060** (Tim Griffin, November 2023), issued at the request of Rep. Rick McClure (R-Malvern), addresses whether a city or county may, by ordinance, **prohibit a digital asset mining operation.** Its holding: a local government **cannot ban** digital asset mining, because Arkansas counties and cities hold only the powers granted them by the constitution or statute (Dillon's Rule), and a local ordinance conflicting with state law is invalid. The opinion grounds this in the local-preemption protections of A.C.A. § 14-1-604(a) (the [[Arkansas Data Centers Act of 2023 (Act 851) and 2024 Amendments|Arkansas Data Centers Act of 2023]]). At the 2026-05-26 Quorum Court meeting, the County Attorney circulated this opinion and warned that the county would be sued if it passed the data-center moratorium. ## How it appears in the corpus The opinion is the legal basis for the County Attorney's objection at the [[2026-05 Pulaski County Quorum Court Vote on Data Center Moratorium|2026-05-26 moratorium vote]], and it shapes the county's pivot toward a Planning Board zoning process (see [[2026-05 Pulaski County Quorum Court Refers Five Data-Center Measures to Planning Board]]). **Now Tier-1 anchored (2026-05-29).** The Pulaski County Clerk's moratorium-records production includes both the full two-page text of Opinion 2023-060 **and** County Attorney [[Hamilton Kemp]]'s 2026-05-27 memorandum applying it — see [[County Attorney Memo and AG Opinion 2023-060 on the Moratorium]]. Kemp's memo states the moratorium *"impermissibly suspends authority granted by Arkansas law to permit construction of data centers in Pulaski County,"* citing the [[Arkansas Data Centers Act of 2023 (Act 851) and 2024 Amendments|Arkansas Data Centers Act of 2023]] (Ark. Code § 14-1-601 et seq.) and its amendments (§ 23-119-101 et seq.), and records his refusal to sign the ordinance. This converts the prior Tier-3 paraphrase of the County Attorney's objection into a Tier-1 documentary record and supplies the statutory hooks. ## Open legal questions The opinion's reach as applied to a *data-center* (AI/hyperscale) measure is contested. Four points bear on it (Tier-2/Tier-3, to be confirmed against the primary texts and by counsel): 1. **Scope — mining vs. AI/hyperscale.** The opinion and Act 851 concern *digital asset mining* (blockchain). AI/cloud hyperscale campuses are a different category that Arkansas law treats separately ([[Act 548 (2025)]] excludes cryptocurrency mining from data-center tax benefits). 2. **Statutory currency.** The 2024 General Assembly substantially narrowed Act 851's local-preemption framework: Act 173 of 2024 subjects mining businesses to generally-applicable local operations-and-safety ordinances and mandatory noise-reduction duties (with a 2,000-ft neighbor private right of action), while **preserving** the data-center-parity anti-discrimination clause in amended § 14-1-605(a) — a local government still may not "[i]mpose a different requirement for a digital asset mining business than is applicable to any requirement for a data center" (primary public record, [Act 173 of 2024 enrolled text](../../web%20archive/2026-06-10/arkleg.state.ar.us/act-173-of-2024.md); see [[Arkansas Data Centers Act of 2023 (Act 851) and 2024 Amendments]]). A 2023 opinion construing the pre-2024 statute is of reduced force — though the earlier shorthand "repealed ... and restored" overstated it; the surviving parity clause still constrains *mining-specific* local rules, and by its symmetry makes the regulatory treatment of data centers the benchmark. 3. **Anti-discrimination, not immunity.** Act 851's protection barred regulating mining *worse than* data centers; it did not immunize data centers from generally applicable regulation. 4. **Ban vs. regulate.** The opinion addresses outright *bans*; *regulation* (zoning, noise, setbacks, applied generally) is the path it leaves open — and the path the Quorum Court's Planning Board referral takes. ## Notes An Arkansas Attorney General opinion is **advisory, not binding**; a court is not bound by it, though it informs the County Attorney's litigation posture. The full opinion text is Tier-1 anchored via the #26-341 production ([[County Attorney Memo and AG Opinion 2023-060 on the Moratorium]]); the underlying 2024 amendment statutes are now archived at Tier-2 ([Act 173 of 2024](../../web%20archive/2026-06-10/arkleg.state.ar.us/act-173-of-2024.md), [Act 174 of 2024](../../web%20archive/2026-06-10/arkleg.state.ar.us/act-174-of-2024.md), archived 2026-06-10). The County Attorney also identified the Arkansas Oil & Gas Commission as the permitting authority for digital asset mining (per the 2024 amendments) — relevant to mining, not to AI/cloud data centers.