Amazon will invest $150 million in a new 1.2 million-square-foot fulfillment center near Interstate 57 and University Parkway in University Park that is expected to create at least 800 jobs, the village and company confirmed Thursday.
Amazon, through the project’s developer, Venture One Real Estate, will pay $1 million in impact fees to the village to buy Police and Fire department vehicles, although the village would, over a couple of years, pay that money back.
The Village Board last month approved a redevelopment agreement for the project, referred to obliquely in village documents as “Project Condor” or “Project Bluebird.”
The development is underway at the southwest corner of Central Avenue and Steger Road, just north of the I-57/University Parkway interchange. The village said construction began about a week ago.
Amazon’s distribution center will handle larger customer orders, such as sports equipment, patio furniture, bicycles and larger household items, a spokeswoman for the retailer said in an email Thursday.
The facility would generate more than 800 full-time jobs paying a minimum hourly wage of $15, she said.
It’s expected to be operating in two years, according to the village.
The development is in a tax increment financing district, in which property taxes to school, park and library districts, the village, the county and other taxing districts are frozen at current levels, in this case for 20 years. Any increase in taxes as a result of development, the increment, goes into a special fund to help pay or reimburse for improvements.
Village official’s agreed to share those TIF funds with the developer and Amazon, with Amazon receiving 75% of the funds, and the village will receiving the remaining 25%. The village would use its share to reimburse the $1 million in impact fees the developer is paying upfront.
Originally, University Park officials had planned a news conference for Wednesday to announce plans by a Fortune 500 company for a development that would create about 1,000 jobs. The event was canceled just hours before the planned starting time.
Village officials released details Thursday following a report by Crain’s Chicago Business about Amazon beefing up its warehousing and distribution space in the Chicago market, including University Park.
The new fulfillment center would be just a couple of miles north of a larger distribution center Amazon operates off I-57 at Monee Manhattan Road in Monee.
The center is one of six facilities Amazon operates in Will County, with University Park becoming the seventh. Amazon has more than 7,000 employees at its Will County locations and is the county’s biggest employer, according to the county.
Backers of a long-proposed third airport in the far south suburbs have cited the increase in warehouse-distribution development in the region, including Amazon, as a reason to move forward with plans. Planners have said that, initially, the airport’s focus would be on cargo shipments.
At a March 13 Village Board meeting where the redevelopment agreement was approved, Trustee Theaplise “Theo” Brooks spared with Mayor Joseph Roudez.
Brooks said he and other trustees had seen the redevelopment agreement only a few hours before the meeting and asked that a vote be delayed until more discussion could take place. At one point, Roudez loudly bangs his gavel on the table to cut off Brooks and calls for an immediate vote.
As the roll call is taken Brooks loudly says “hell no” to approving it and quickly leaves the table where officials were seated.
Amazon’s name is never mentioned during the discussion, with Mark Goode, a principal of the developer, Rosemont-based Venture One Real Estate, saying the tenant of the building “we’re calling Condor,” although “everybody here now knows who it is.”
The agreement was also approved that night for 1st, 2nd and 3rd readings, bypassing a process whereby items are introduced at one meeting and discussed as a committee at another before coming up for a final vote.
A TIF agreement covering the 83-acre site was to have been in place for 17 years, but board members agreed to extend it to 20 to give Venture One and Amazon additional time to recoup development costs.
Chicago-based architectural, engineering and construction company Clayco is overseeing the building for Amazon, and also was the general contractor for the Monee facility as well as a 1.3 million-square-foot Amazon fulfillment center in Channahon.
mnolan@tribpub.com
