The death of local journalism has largely been a quiet affair. Over the course of the past several decades, hundreds if not thousands of smaller outlets like ours have been forced to close their doors for good amid increased costs, dwindling support, and, of course, the advent of the 24hour online news cycle.

But as the saying goes – sometimes you don’t know what you’ve got till it’s gone.

We saw a prime example of this unfold in Kenilworth last month when dozens of residents from across the region crammed into the Borough Hall to share their concerns about a proposed data center slated for construction at the old Merck Pharmaceuticals campus near the Parkway.

Most of the people who came out to speak in front of the Borough’s Planning Board last week said that they learned about the project from a late-April Facebook post by Mayor Linda Karlovitch that touted the center as a “substantial financial opportunity” for the community.

Residents immediately began to post questions about potential health hazards, environmental concerns and the scope of the project’s overall impact for Kenilworth and other neighboring communities like Westfield and Cranford. Many asked via social media when they would have the opportunity to learn more about CoreWeave and its plans for the property.

Unbeknownst to many residents, however, this project has already been in the works for years, and the window for questions and public comments may have already closed.

Merck sold the 108-acres property to Onyx Equities, a Woodbridge based holding company, back in 2023. Onyx quickly re-christened the property as the Northeast Science and Technology (NEST) center and began to bring in tenants.

A few niche online tech publications ran small articles about the property transfer, but there weren’t too many details available at the time.

One of the new lessees, an AI tech firm called CoreWeave, later purchased 36-acres of the campus from Onyx. They approached the Kenilworth Planning Board in May of last year with a proposal to build 31 generators, four water tanks and 29 “chiller units” designed to keep the high-voltage facility from overheating.

Meeting minutes from 2025 indicate that no one from the public voiced any opposition to the project, and the Planning Board granted its consent without any comments from residents.

This is where a local news source – if one existed in Kenilworth – would have stepped in. As local journalists, we sit through hours and hours (and hours) of public meetings every year. We read agendas, we meet with elected officials and we pay attention to things that most people simply don’t have time to get involved with. But when there is no one there to ask the questions, things – even big things like this – can easily slip through the cracks.

We know, given the turn out at last week’s Planning Board meeting, that residents would have followed this process much more closely had they known what was happening at the site from the get go, but no one was there to document the process.

Kenilworth has never been in our coverage area. Our resources are already stretched thin across seven different municipalities, the County and the State. The Union County Local Source (a combination of many weekly papers of blessed memory) rarely covers government meetings anymore. There is a TAPinto Kenilworth franchise, but they don’t appear to be covering any government meetings or even local elections, and haven’t posted a byline story since early April.

Multiple outlets (including The Leader) picked up the story last month when rumors about the data center – and the neighbor’s clear opposition to it – began to circulate online. In many ways, however, it was already too late.

Construction on the data center has already begun, and there may not be anything that residents can do to stop it.

This is why local news matters. Politicians, business owners and developers cannot be counted on to keep people in the loop – especially when their decisions could lead to public outcry. Kenilworth is certainly not alone. There are dozens of towns in New Jersey (not to mention in other states) that have to fend for themselves these days when it comes to finding reputable sources of information, and that’s a problem. We do what we can to provide responsible coverage of this area given our limited resources and staff – that’s why every ad, every subscription, every click matters. We work hard to prevent unpleasant surprises like massive data centers from popping up unannounced in your backyards – but we can’t do it without your help.