Philadelphia A Finalist For Amazon HQ2, Company Announces

PHILADELPHIA –Amazon announced Thursday that 20 cities are finalists for its second headquarters, and Philadelphia is among those making the cut.

Philadelphia made its official bid to house the new Amazon Headquarters, shorthanded as "HQ2," in October 2017.

"Philadelphia’s inclusion in Amazon’s Top 20 potential locations for HQ2 is an exciting milestone for the city," Mayor Jim Kenney said of Philly making the cut. "We are thrilled at today’s announcement, and look forward to working with Amazon’s team on the next steps of this process to further highlight all that Philadelphia has to offer."

Three sites the city is floating for the new headquarters are Schuylkill Yards, uCity Square in University City, and the Navy Yard.

The New York Times reports that more than 230 applicants from the United States, Canada, and Mexico made bids to house the HQ2, which Amazon says will require about $5 billion in construction and create thousands of jobs.

With the list whittled down to 20, Amazon will now work with each applicant to learn more about their proposals and examine the feasibility of the potential agreement with the applicants.

The company said it expects to announce the winner at some point this year.

"Thank you to all 238 communities that submitted proposals. Getting from 238 to 20 was very tough – all the proposals showed tremendous enthusiasm and creativity," said Holly Sullivan, with Amazon Public Policy. "Through this process we learned about many new communities across North America that we will consider as locations for future infrastructure investment and job creation."

Below are all the applicants that made the cut:

• Atlanta
• Austin, Tex.
• Boston
• Chicago
• Columbus, Ohio
• Dallas
• Denver
• Indianapolis
• Los Angeles
• Miami
• Montgomery County, Md.
• Nashville
• Newark
• New York
• Northern Virginia
• Philadelphia
• Pittsburgh
• Raleigh, N.C.
• Toronto, Canada
• Washington, D.C.

Philadelphia officials made an announcement on Oct. 19 that they were bidding to house the Amazon HQ2.

In the announcement, Mayor Jim Kenney thanked the diverse coalition that made the Philadelphia region's bid for Amazon HQ2 possible, following the official submission of the proposal to Amazon.

"The support we received from the leaders and the residents of this region in preparing our bid for HQ2 is really inspiring - not only because we received so much support, but also because we received it from so many different types of people," said Mayor Kenney. "Thanks to their insight, we were able to show that Philadelphia is in the Goldilocks zone for Amazon. Our location is central on the Northeast corridor, our talent pool is vast, and Philadelphia has all of the amenities Amazon's employees want, at a lower cost than other big cities."

The city also created a new website designed to highlight the area's talent, logistics, livability, and three proposed sites for Amazon.

Several suburban Philadelphia communities also applied, including Delaware County, Bensalem Township in Bucks county, and Camden County. Those communities were not selected as finalists.

Despite not being among the finalists, Camden County officials said Philadelphia's inclusion is a good thing for the area.

"This is great news for Philadelphia, Camden and South Jersey," Camden County Freeholder Director Louis Cappelli Jr. said. "We believe if the Philadelphia Metropolitan region makes the final cut it will be a win for the overall region and that it will benefit our area with billions of dollars in new development and more than 50,000 new highly paid employees. Furthermore, we believe that Camden City's rebirth and economic growth in Camden County had a direct impact on the proposal and played a key role in boosting it to the next level."

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