South County officials have identified two sites that they believe hit all the targets for Amazon’s HQ2 – a second headquarters location for the Seattle e-commerce giant that could eventually employ 50,000 workers.

The sites – one in Chula Vista and the other in Otay Mesa – were unveiled Tuesday at a meeting of the South County Economic Development Council.

“We all understand Amazon coming into anywhere in San Diego County would be a win,” said Cindy Gompper-Graves, chief executive of the South County EDC. “Amazon coming into South County would be a huge win for South County, so we want to make sure we are in the mix.”

Last month, Amazon announced that it was searching for a second home to complement its current downtown Seattle headquarters. The company will consider cities that have more than a million people, a tech savvy workforce, a business friendly environment, are within 45 minutes of an international airport and have access to mass transit, among other things. Proposals are due no later than Oct. 19.


Competition for Amazon’s HQ2 will be fierce -- given that the company expects to create jobs with average salaries of more than $100,000 per year. Dozens of metropolitan areas all over the country are throwing their hats in the ring.

The local bid is being pieced together by the San Diego Regional Economic Development Corp. Its proposal will likely include three to five locations that Amazon could explore throughout the county, said Mark Cafferty, head of the San Diego Regional EDC.

“Do they want a suburban campus? Do they want a downtown campus? Do they want something that is completely undeveloped?” said Cafferty. “We want to give them enough ideas about what can be done in the region so that -- if the talent number and the demographics all pan out -- they can say OK, we have three or four different looks at what we can do.”


The sites that will be included in San Diego County’s proposal to Amazon are still being worked out. Speculation is that properties downtown and the former Qualcomm Stadium location in Mission Valley are likely to be included.

South County is making its case to have its two sites – which include a combination of lots -- included in the region’s bid.

The first is the Millenia Office project along Highway 125 near Birch Road. It is being developed by Chestnut Properties and has received city approval for millions of square feet of office space, with 500,000 square feet expected to be ready by the third quarter of 2019.

That meets Amazon’s development time frame for the first phase of HQ2.


“We can deliver what they are asking for,” said Eric Crockett, director of the Chula Vista’s Economic Development Department. “Not only do we have the 8 million square feet entitled, we have a developer that has building plans ready to pull that can actually deliver a brand new 500,000-square-foot building by the 2019 deadline.”

For future expansion of HQ2, Chula Vista has earmarked land adjacent to the Millenia Oiffce campus to meet Amazon’s needs.

Crockett believes Amazon’s decision could come down to “whether they want a suburban office location and whether or not other states are going to throw billions of dollars at them.”

The second site is in Otay Mesa and includes a handful of lots straddling Highway 905 in the general area of the Brown Field Technology Park, said Gompper-Graves.


Amazon doesn’t want bids from individual cities or counties. It has urged metropolitan statistical areas to submit a single proposal for a region.

The San Diego Regional Economic Development Corp. has been pitched several sites in the region, said Cafferty, and will have to trim the list down to four or five to submit to Amazon.

Even if its sites don’t make the cut, South County will not submit independently, said Gompper-Graves.

“We understand – even though we are very proud of South County – this is a regional proposal going forward,” she said.


Business


mike.freeman@sduniontribune.com;

Twitter:@TechDiego

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