The proposal contains “nine separate and distinct locations throughout Los Angeles County,” according to a statement from Bill Allen, CEO of the Los Angeles County Economic Development Coroporation (LAEDC), which is leading the bid effort.
Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti’s spokesman, Alex Comisar, said the LAEDC’s bid contains “several sites in the city (of Los Angeles) and several outside the city.”
Comisar did not disclose the specific sites, but one San Fernando Valley-area councilman, Bob Blumenfield, has been vocal about his support for bringing Amazon to the former Rocketdyne site in Woodland Hill’s Warner Center.
Meanwhile, Los Angeles County officials this week touted the 500-acre Fairplex in Pomona as an ideal location for Amazon, which is asking for space of at least 500,000 square feet, initially in 2019, and up to as much as 8 million square feet after 2027.
Lawren Markle, spokesman for the LAEDC, confirmed that both Pomona and city of Los Angeles are part of the bid.
Allen said in his statement that while “the specific sites are not being disclosed by the LAEDC for competitive reasons, they afford Amazon a strong set of options (including existing collections of buildings, in-fill development opportunities and greenfield sites) to choose amongst, while still being able to meet Amazon’s timeline and development plans.”
The LAEDC’s bid highlights the L.A. region’s logistics and infrastructure advantages, the quality of the employee pool in the area, the transit options, and the “costs and incentives” available to Amazon if the company decides to locate here, according to Allen.
Amazon’s request for proposals asked that bidders share a “summary of total incentives offered for the project by the state/province and local community,” and encouraged bids from places with business-friendly measures or attractive tax structures.
Allen said the L.A. region’s bid was done in “full cooperation of California Governor Jerry Brown, the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors, City of Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti and his staff and the mayors and city managers of each city in the region with a site meeting or exceeding Amazon’s requirements … ”
Cities in Los Angeles County are not the only ones in the Southern California area looking to draw Amazon to their area. Irvine also wants to secure the headquarters, as does Michael Harrah, a developer who recently unveiled a proposal to bring Amazon to downtown Santa Ana and the former site of the Orange County Register.
These Southern California bidders would join several nationwide that are hoping to serve as Amazon’s second corporate home.
©2017 the Daily News (Los Angeles) Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.
