The Bloomington, Indiana, Common Council voted on Wednesday, November 4, to ban the distribution and deployment of superintelligent AI inside the city. “The ordinance passed unanimously”, the Indiana Daily Student reported. The Safe AI Forever Institute, an advocacy group that backed it, put the tally at 7-0.
The ban can be lifted only if the council finds a 99.9999% safety standard has been met and “an affirmative vote of more than 95% of registered voters” approves, according to the ordinance text. By our arithmetic, that voter test cannot be met at any turnout below 95%.
Business Pill · Guardrails Explained
A short Business Engineer explainer on AI guardrails, the rules and controls placed around AI systems. It teaches the general idea only and does not discuss Bloomington’s ordinance.
The key insight: Bloomington’s Common Council unanimously passed Ordinance 2026-29 on November 4, banning the distribution and deployment of superintelligence in the city, including use through a browser, API or connected hardware wherever the servers are. Lifting it requires a 99.9999% safety finding and more than 95% of registered voters; by our arithmetic, the voter test cannot be met below 95% turnout.
Ordinance 2026-29, sponsored by councilmember Dave Rollo, adds Chapter 14.25, “Prohibition of Superintelligence”, to the city code. It says “No person or corporation shall distribute or permit to be distributed nor deployed into the premises of any citizen or business in our City, any Superintelligence for any purpose”.
The ordinance defines superintelligence with the phrase “Any intellect that greatly exceeds the cognitive performance of humans in virtually all domains of interest”. It also describes autonomous systems capable of “self-modifying its core algorithms” or “operating without continuous human oversight”.
Under Section 3, it takes effect after passage, “approval by the Mayor” and any required publication. The ordinance does not name any company or product.
Yes votes needed, as a share of ballots cast, to meet the ordinance condition of more than 95% of registered voters, by turnout. Our arithmetic: 95 divided by turnout. Source: Bloomington Ordinance 2026-29, Sec. 14.25.040(b).
It Reaches Any Browser in City Limits
Deployment covers use “through a locally accessed interface, browser, API, or connected hardware within the City of Bloomington”, the text says, “regardless of the physical location of the server infrastructure hosting the system”.
A “Deployer” is defined as any commercial entity, organization, or developer that puts such a system into use “which allows data to enter Bloomington City Limits”. The local news site B Square Bulletin wrote that, on the ordinance’s wording, both a resident using such a system from home and the company offering it could be breaking the law.
Fines, Lawsuits and the Prosecutor
The city “may seek civil penalties, injunctive relief, and, where appropriate, referral to the Monroe County Prosecutor”, the ordinance says, adding that “This enforcement power is discretionary”. Violations fall under the general penalty provision of the city code, which B Square says allows fines up to $2,500, with separate penalties for each day of a continuing violation.
The ordinance also says it does not limit any private right of action under state or federal law. Rollo’s memo to the council argues that the ordinance “can help plaintiffs meet their burden of proof” in lawsuits against AI developers.
How the Ban Could End
The ban expires “ninety- one (91) days” after Indiana enacts a comprehensive framework for “Provably Safe Superintelligence”. Without that, the council must find two things: broad scientific consensus at “a safety level of 99.9999% percent certainty”, and voter approval by more than 95% of registered voters.
The test counts registered voters, not ballots cast. By our arithmetic, the yes share of ballots needed is 95 divided by turnout: 190% of ballots at 50% turnout, 127% at 75% and 95% only if every registered voter turns out. Below 95% turnout, the test cannot be met.
B Square wrote that “Nothing about the proposed ordinance appears to prevent a future city council, or even the current edition of the council, from repealing the ban through the ordinary legislative process”.
The Legal Questions
B Square’s analysis, published before the vote, said “The ordinance doesn’t establish a test, name a certifying authority or say who decides whether a system has crossed the line to superintelligence”. It also asked whether the city has authority to regulate technology supplied from outside its boundaries.
The outlet noted that Indiana’s Home Rule Act gives municipalities broad powers, but that state law prohibits local governments from conducting elections without explicit statutory authorization, which bears on the 95% voter condition. These are the outlet’s readings; no court has ruled on the ordinance.
The Business Lever: 350 Cities
Rollo’s memo is explicit about the target. It says “Over 100 million people live in U.S. cities of Bloomington’s size or greater”, and that “If those (approximately 350) cities passed similar ordinances in the coming weeks or months, this would create a massive regulatory burden for companies creating ASI”.
The memo names the SAFE AI Forever Institute and other non-profits as “poised to encourage other municipalities to adopt their own prohibitions on ASI”. The memo also says “the liability costs could be profound enough to prevent any insurers from providing product liability insurance”.
In a statement released by the institute, Rollo called it “a carefully crafted, interim public safety perimeter that protects Bloomington while higher levels of government have not yet acted”.
How Bloomington Got Here
This is Rollo’s third attempt since 2023, B Square reported. A July 2023 resolution calling for a moratorium on artificial general intelligence was withdrawn after about an hour of discussion; Indiana University had relayed concerns about research funding, and the proposal lacked enough votes, B Square reported. On June 10, 2026, the council unanimously approved a nonbinding resolution urging a federal moratorium.
As we read the ordinance, it names no company or product, so its effect depends on a definition that B Square says comes with no test or certifying authority.
As we read Rollo’s memo, the goal is replication: it puts the potential at about 350 cities of Bloomington’s size or greater and names non-profits poised to encourage them.
As we read B Square’s analysis, the strongest legal questions are about reach beyond city limits and the city’s power to hold the 95% vote.
Bloomington Ordinance 2026-29, Sec. 14.25.030
“regardless of the physical location of the server infrastructure hosting the system”
Three Implications
FOR AI DEVELOPERS Rollo’s memo says that if about 350 cities passed similar ordinances, this would create a massive regulatory burden for companies creating ASI.
FOR LITIGANTS The ordinance says it does not limit any private right of action under state or federal law, and the memo says it can help plaintiffs meet their burden of proof.
FOR THE CITY The ordinance says enforcement is discretionary, and B Square says nothing appears to prevent a future council repealing it by ordinary vote.
The essay says “The governance layer sits at the intersection of capability, regulation, national security, access control, and geopolitical alignment.”
As we read it, Bloomington’s ordinance is an attempt to write access control into a city code. The essay does not discuss Bloomington or local ordinances.
What Is Not Established
This piece relies on the Indiana Daily Student for the vote and on the advocacy group’s release for the 7-0 tally; it does not quote official council minutes. Whether the mayor has approved the ordinance is not stated in the sources. No source says any system now on the market meets the ordinance’s definition, and none says how the city would detect one.
This Week In The AI Supercycle
The Great Convergence of Capital, Power, and Geopolitics
This week’s issue: for two years the AI build-out was priced as a supply story, and last week as a credit story. This week it was priced as a permission story, and the answer arrived as a cost, not a ban.
Bloomington’s council unanimously passed a ban on superintelligence that reaches any browser, API or device in city limits, wherever the servers sit. Lifting it requires a 99.9999% safety finding and more than 95% of registered voters; by our arithmetic, that is impossible below 95% turnout. The sponsor’s memo aims for about 350 cities to follow.
A note on sourcing. The vote is from the Indiana Daily Student’s report of the November 4 meeting; the 7-0 tally is from the Safe AI Forever Institute’s release. Ordinance and memo quotations are from the text published with the council packet for October 14. Legal questions are B Square Bulletin’s. The turnout figures are our arithmetic.
Gennaro Cuofano is a CRO and tech executive who has worked in AI since late 2015, starting with bringing NLP, natural-language generation, voice and chatbot products to the marketing industry. His background is in law and finance: he holds a Master's degree in Law and an International MBA with an emphasis on corporate finance (LUISS Business School and the University of San Diego, 2012), and worked as a financial analyst at a real-estate investment firm in San Diego and as an assistant controller. His work focuses on business model strategy, business engineering and, more broadly, structural analysis: how companies make money, read from their own filings. He created FourWeekMBA and leads research there and at The Business Engineer, his newsletter on AI and business strategy, with over 95,000 subscribers and more than 1,000 published analyses. His writing has also appeared on Entrepreneur (for example, How to Digitize a Family Business in Europe) and HackerNoon. Find him on LinkedIn and Substack. See how we source.
