GENEVA – The world’s largest online retailer, Amazon, could be the true applicant behind a proposed 278,000-square-foot distribution facility proposed for the southeast corner of Division Street and Kirk Road in Geneva, according to city documents.
On pages 270 and 271 of the Oct. 4 City Council agenda packet, civil engineering company Jacob & Hefner included the Amazon logo, along with its building design template and email address.
Residents opposed to the plan found the link to Amazon in the documents.
The proposal was postponed from that City Council meeting to Oct. 18, for a hearing on a 54-acre annexation, a special use and zoning change to allow the facility on the southeast corner of Division Street and Kirk Road.
Jason Cebulski, Jacob & Hefner project manager for the Geneva Farms North proposal, would not confirm that Amazon is actually the petitioner behind the proposed facility.
“I did not prepare that,” Cebulski said, saying another employee at the firm included the Amazon name and logo in documents filed to the city. “Even if I did know that, I could not answer that question.”
Peter Bazos, the attorney representing the listed developer Crow Holdings, said, “I cannot confirm or deny” that the true petitioner is Amazon because of a non-disclosure agreement.
“That is what I am told by the developer, Crow Holdings,” Bazos said.
A message left with Crow Holdings was not returned. An email to Amazon’s media hotline was not immediately answered.
But Geneva Mayor Kevin Burns said Amazon’s alleged role in the project “is irrelevant.”
“The City Council’s charge on Monday evening is to consider the testimony provided at the Planning and Zoning Commission, and to hear new testimony relevant to an agreement regarding only the land use,” Burns said. “We are not permitted, under state law and city ordinance, to consider the end-user – irrespective of who that end-user is. The end-user is immaterial because our charge, as clearly stated, is to consider the land-use implication.”
Source: The Daily Chronicle
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