Broward Joins Bidding War To Bring New Amazon Headquarters To Town
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BROWARD (CBSMiami) – Amazon wants to spend billions on a new headquarters. Business leaders in South Florida say there's an obvious choice.
CEO Jeff Bezos has plans for a brand new eight-million-square-foot, 50,000-employee campus – and he's making a competition out of it.
Amazon put out a request for proposals for a second headquarters this month.
Cities like Los Angeles and Brooklyn are trying to entice the company. Even Gary, Indiana, with a population of 80,000, paid for an advertisement in the New York Times.
"This is a transformational event that could come to South Florida," said Michael Udine.
Udine, a Broward County Commissioner, got in on the action, writing a letter to Bezos.
Click here to read the letter.
"We have three airports within an hour for executives that need to fly in," Udine said. "We are a gateway to Latin America... that would really be something that would take it to the next level."
It's a team effort though, with Broward, Miami-Dade and Palm Beach Counties creating a joint proposal. The Greater Fort Lauderdale Alliance is also part of the trio.
"Think about this: 50,000 employees," said David Coddington. "Think of how much that will impact the economic stimulus here."
And the skies the limit for South Florida's tech future. If Amazon validates the model, then other companies would follow suit.
"Who else wants to be around amazon? Who else is going to service those? And that's the other compelling part of it," Coddington said.
If all that isn't enough, they're hoping allegiance to one's hometown is enough to sway the decision in our favor.
"Every region is going to bid for this because everyone is going to want this in their region," Udine said. "The fact that he graduated from Palmetto in Miami, he's from South Florida, I think add to the equation in a positive way."
The deadline for proposals is October 19th, which officials say they will meet.
Amazon is already investing in South Florida. It recently announced plans to build a center at the Opa-locka airport and bring about 1,000 full-time jobs to South Florida.