Washington County residents could see new transparency from Amazon on data center projects. The company pledged Friday, Oct. 2, to stop requiring government agencies to sign nondisclosure agreements and to invest more than $1 billion over five years in communities hosting its facilities.

The county has 29 data centers, more than any other county in Oregon, and received $20.5 million in property tax revenue from those facilities last year, about 1% of the countywide tax base, OPB reported.

Secrecy has been a flashpoint.

Portland City Council unanimously approved a resolution Sept. 17 asking its city administrator to stop signing data center NDAs, as KGW reported. In Washington County, Commissioners Nafisa Fai and Pam Treece asked then-Chair Kathryn Harrington to create a data center task force at a Sept. 1 work session, according to Cedar Mill News. Harrington has since resigned. Whether the task force was formally created is unclear from public records. No data centers currently operate in unincorporated Washington County; all 29 are in cities, primarily Hillsboro.

Matt Garman, CEO of Amazon Web Services, wrote in a company blog post that Amazon has already spent more than $1 billion in data center communities over the past three years. The new program, called "Built Together," targets education, job training, energy affordability and water preservation. Amazon said it aims to connect more than 300,000 students to free degree access and upgrade more than 300 schools and community buildings over five years.

Garman also pledged annual public reporting on energy use, water use and the share of carbon-free energy at Amazon's data centers.

The NDA announcement did not address Amazon's documented use of shell companies to conceal its involvement in proposed projects, according to Data Center Dynamics, which first reported that detail. The pledge applies only going forward. Microsoft made a similar commitment earlier in 2026, Data Center Dynamics reported. U.S. Rep. Jamie Raskin, ranking member of the House Judiciary Committee, launched an investigation into Amazon, Google, Meta and Oracle over NDA use days before Amazon's announcement.

Data centers in Oregon will receive nearly $500 million in property tax breaks this year alone, according to Oregonian figures cited by Beaverton Valley Times. A July 2026 DHM Research poll found 71% of Oregonians have a negative view of data centers, and nearly three-quarters of voters oppose property tax incentives for the industry.

The announcement lands weeks before Washington County's Nov. 3 election, where data centers are a defining issue in the District 4 commission race. Hillsboro City Councilor Kipperlyn Sinclair, running for the seat, said in a Sept. 28 OPB report: "These are your public dollars being given away to corporations."

Her opponent, former Hillsboro Mayor Steve Callaway, told OPB the same day he would "never be convinced that, frankly, Elon Musk or … Jeff Bezos, some of these other folks who are putting out data centers, have our best interests in mind."

Gov. Tina Kotek announced Sept. 8 a roughly one-year pause on data center approvals on state land. Her Data Center Advisory Committee is accepting public comments through Oct. 24 at 5 p.m. and plans to send final recommendations by the end of 2026.

No Washington County commissioner had publicly responded to Amazon's announcement as of Saturday, Oct. 3.