BY MEGAN SCHRADER
MSCHRADER@DENVERPOST.COM / @MEGANSCHRADER

Coloradans aren't asking much — Big Tech must pay its own way, protect consumers and not have a net-negative impact on our communities.

In other words, we will not tolerate corporations and CEOs who are a net drag on society.

This month, The Denver Post reported on Coloradans hosting a rally in Elyria-Swansea to oppose the construction of a CoreSite data center next door to homes and parks that could consume as much energy as 82,500 homes.

Palantir Technologies announced it was moving its headquarters to Florida, perhaps in response to legislation regulating artificial intelligence.

And finally Denver City Council rejected a contract with Flock Safety for a network of license plate-reading cameras that many fear is, or will become, part of a federal surveillance system that could be abused.

The answers to these concerns are all shockingly simple, yet they are not terms that Big Tech companies seem willing to accept — regulation and public accountability.

First, all heavy commercial and residential electricity users must pay much higher rates than ordinary users. The system must have better built-in incentives for conservation for heavy users. When electricity companies must make further investment in generation and transmission to accommodate big energy users, those users should be paying most of the burden.

Second, it is impossible to know why Palantir left. I'd guess it was some combination of the AI regulation requiring developers to use "reasonable care" to avoid algorithmic discrimination, the protests at Palantir headquarters over the company's contracts to help ICE track immigrants using a proprietary ImmigrationOS software, and the hilarious "South Park" episode — set in a Colorado mountain town — making fun of Palantir's co-founder and chairman of the board, Peter Thiel. We can't roll back reasonable legislation when the motives behind the move could be based on anything from an executive's bruised ego to an unknowable amount of profit loss.

Third, the request that license plate data collected to help the Denver Police Department find criminals not also be shared with federal agents is a simple request. After all, Denver is paying for the technology, and limiting the use of the data should be entirely within the control of the City of Denver.

All of this probably sounds fairly anti-growth and development. But I don't want to chase these companies out of Colorado. Jobs are jobs, and our economy is fragile. I just want them to operate responsibly in this state and be good neighbors to everyone.

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