The comments came before a scheduled Durham County Board of Commissioners work session.
Last month, commissioners approved a pause on data center construction through May 2027, but the measure applies only to facilities larger than 100,000 square feet.
Residents who returned Tuesday said data centers below that threshold could still be harmful and consume large amounts of energy.
"We in Durham don't want RTP to be the Silicon Valley of the South. We don't want Durham to turn into a bedroom community for high-paid tech workers. We want economic opportunity for the people who live here, especially the communities that actually built Durham. We don't want more displacement here," resident Leslie St. Dre said.
St. Dre also raised concerns about energy use, utility costs, and potential environmental impacts.
"They also didn't regulate energy, use energy rate hikes, water pollution, air pollution, noise pollution, jobs loss, surveillance, all of the things that we know, all the harms that we know, data centers cause," St. Dre said.
Dozens of people attended a county hearing on Aug. 24 when commissioners approved the pause on data center construction for facilities larger than 100,000 square feet.
Some of those residents returned Tuesday to ask commissioners to take additional action and expand protections to smaller data centers.
Commissioners heard public comment Tuesday but did not actively discuss changing the current moratorium.
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