Amazon’s second headquarters won’t be anywhere close to North Texas
Amazon’s second headquarters won’t be anywhere close to North Texas, the online retail giant announced Tuesday.
Dallas-Fort Worth was in the running for the new facility and the estimated 50,000 new jobs it would bring.
But the new headquarters will be split between Long Island City, New York and Arlington County’s Crystal City in Northern Virginia, Amazon said in a news release.
Amazon will invest $5 billion in the two locations, it said. The company expects to create more than 50,000 jobs between the two locations.
Nashville was also selected as the site of Amazon’s new Center of Excellence for Operations, responsible for the company’s customer fulfillment, transportation, supply chain and more, the company announced. That facility is expected to employ about 5,000 people.
“We are excited to build new headquarters in New York City and Northern Virginia,” Amazon founder and CEO Jeff Bezos said in the news release. “These two locations will allow us to attract world-class talent that will help us to continue inventing for customers for years to come.”
A spokeswoman for the office of Dallas Mayor Mike Rawlings said the mayor had no comment.
Fort Worth Mayor Betsy Price said the application process “was a great exercise for the entire DFW region to work together and showcase the opportunities within our community.”
“We will continue to tout our strong business environment and quality of life as we work on implementing our economic strategic plan,” Price said in an email.
“This was an historic opportunity for all DFW-area communities to work together, leverage all of our assets and showcase our region,” said Brandom Gengelbach, executive vice president of economic development for the Fort Worth Chamber of Commerce in a statement. “We put our very best foot forward in a way that will serve us well in the pursuit of future economic development opportunities.”
“Make no mistake, this has been a ‘win’ for our region regardless of the outcome,” CEO of the Dallas Regional Chamber Dale Petroskey said in a statement.
“Our business community grows and expands by the day, and our momentum as a destination of choice has only increased as a result of being a finalist for HQ2,” Petroskey said.
Mike Rosa, senior vice president of economic development at the Dallas Regional Chamber, said: “We like to win, and we’re used to winning, so while we are disappointed, we understand Amazon’s decision is one they believe is best for their company at this time.”
In September 2017, Price and Rawlings teamed up at the Texas Tribune Festival to pitch the Dallas-Fort Worth region to Amazon.
Asked why she thought the region would be a good fit for Amazon, Price said, “Because it’s Fort Worth and Dallas. What more do you have to say? With Fort Worth being the best piece of that.”
The only publicly identified site pitched from Fort Worth was the Panther Island development north of downtown.
Grapevine Mayor William D. Tate also made a pitch in the fall of 2017, pointing to an 800-acre tract of undeveloped land he thought would be a great location.
“It has access to commuter rail, mass transit, nine area highways and easy access to the airport,” Tate said.
Arlington and Irving were among about a dozen North Texas cities to submit bids for the second Amazon headquarters.
Housing advocates voice concerns
A coalition advocating for local and national community, housing, labor, small business, faith and environmental groups voiced concerns about the selection process in a statement Tuesday.
“Arlington (Va.) already has an affordable housing crisis due to gentrification and rising rents, which HQ2 will surely exacerbate,” said Alex Howe of Metro DC Democratic Socialists of America Northern Virginia Branch.
“Our schools are already at capacity across the region with no clear solution planned regardless of the impact of HQ2. We must have intentional safeguards put in place, such as a significant annual contribution toward a community land trust, to make sure HQ2 doesn’t displace our existing communities and increase inequality.”
“New Yorkers want to know: why are we giving away taxpayer dollars to the richest man on earth while our communities get sidelined for the funds we need to fix public transit and our growing housing crisis?” said Maritza Silva-Farrell, executive director of ALIGN, an alliance of community and labor united for a just and sustainable New York.
“Amazon vaguely touts that it will create thousands of jobs, but we know that unless we demand equitable development and job creation, tech companies like Amazon will continue to leave low-income communities and communities of color out in the cold.”
While Amazon will be investing about $2.5 billion into each community, a company news release says that the company will receive more than $1.5 billion in performance-based incentives in Long Island City and $573 million in incentives in Arlington.
This is a developing story and will be updated.
This story was originally published November 13, 2018 at 9:13 AM with the headline "Amazon’s second headquarters won’t be anywhere close to North Texas."