DICAData Infrastructure Community Assurance County or municipal staff? Get the adoption kit

For county counsel, administrators and planning staff

The developer proposed the bond amount. Who checked it?

On most data-center approvals the financial assurance figure arrives as a negotiated number with no stated basis — and is released on a calendar rather than on evidence. DICA replaces it with a published function, cited documents, and a reviewer your jurisdiction directs.

Get the adoption kit Run the calculation first

Six documents, including the model clause. No account, no sales call unless you ask for one.

One clauseFits inside the development agreement you already use.

Applicant-fundedReview is paid from an applicant account, directed by you.

ReproducibleA second reviewer must reach the same number or name the input.

Open methodPart A is public. Nothing about the number is proprietary.

The problem, precisely

The figure is not wrong so much as unaccountable.

A hearing does not usually turn on whether $40 million is the right amount. It turns on the fact that nobody in the room can say where $40 million came from — which means it cannot be defended when challenged, cannot be raised when circumstances change, and cannot be lowered when the applicant does the work to deserve it.

No stated basis

The number is a negotiation outcome. It carries no function, no inputs, and no record of what it was meant to cover — so every future dispute restarts from zero.

No evidence discipline

An applicant’s own estimate and an independent reviewed study count the same. The diligent applicant is charged exactly what the undiligent one is.

Release on a calendar

Assurance steps down because time passed, not because risk fell. The instrument expires at the moment the obligation matures.

What replaces it

Four questions, asked in order, each answered once.

Most arguments about assurance are really arguments about double-counting — the same protection credited twice, or the same uncertainty charged twice. Fixing the order removes the argument.

01 ATTRIBUTION

What is ours?

The share of a cost this project causes, separated from background growth it did not create.

02 PROTECTION

What already covers it?

Contract, insurance, tariff and statute standing ahead of the community, credited at instrument strength.

03 UNCERTAINTY

How well is it known?

Evidence class drives the loading. This is the lever the applicant controls — and the reason to prove things.

04 LIKELIHOOD

How much to cover?

A continuous coverage function. No bands, so no project sits just on the favorable side of a line.

What changes in the record

Same project. Two ways of arriving at a number.

Negotiated figure

$40M

Agreed across the table. Defensible only to the extent the parties still agree.

Basis of the amount — not stated
Which costs it covers — not stated
Evidence behind the inputs — not distinguished
What would raise or lower it — renegotiation
Reproducible by a third party — no

Determination under DICA

$40M

The amount may land in the same place. What differs is everything behind it.

Basis — published function, named version
Coverage — itemised by exposure bucket
Evidence — each input classed and cited by digest
What lowers it — better evidence, computed
Reproducible by a third party — yes

Illustrative comparison. Not a determination.

This is the argument to make in a hearing room: DICA is not a demand for a bigger number. It is a demand that the number have a reason — which is as often an argument for lowering it as raising it.

Before you forward this to counsel

The four things the applicant’s lawyer will say.

This is an exaction dressed up as arithmetic.

It attaches only to costs attributed to the project and not already covered by an instrument standing ahead of the community. Both are computed and disclosed, so the objection resolves to a specific input.

Your consultant’s number is unreviewable.

It is reviewable line by line. The function is public and every input cites a document; a second reviewer must reach the same figure or name where they differ.

You are pricing the fee off the number.

No fee under this standard may be indexed to the amount determined. That is a conformance condition, not a policy preference.

This will make the project uninvestable.

Most of a first-pass requirement is uncertainty loading, not exposure. Independent review of the largest self-attested inputs removes a material share of it — and the reduction survives a change of administration.

The ask

Take the kit to your next pre-application meeting.

Six documents. Everything a jurisdiction needs to require a determination without writing a new ordinance — drafted to sit inside the development agreement you already use.

Model assurance clause MC-6, with drafting notes
Peer-review funding mechanism — applicant-funded, jurisdiction-directed
Assessor conduct and conflict-of-interest rules
Release and step-down schedule template
Three-page staff briefing memo in plain English
Objection handling — developer counsel’s arguments, with answers