Parts Of Amazon Talks Were Kept Secret Under Non-Disclosure Deal

LONG ISLAND CITY, NY — The city and state agencies that lured Amazon to Long Island City signed non-disclosure agreements with the huge company, effectively promising to keep parts of the talks secret from the public, officials acknowledged Monday.

Both the city's Economic Development Corporation and the state's Empire State Development signed a contract, or NDA, with the online retail colossus that was lured here with $3 billion in incentives, officials said.

City and state officials did not specify who signed it or what information was protected. But an Amazon spokesman said the agreement with the communities it picked for its new headquarters locations — New York City and Arlington, Virginia — "protects confidential information that Amazon might have shared with them during the search process."

Empire State Development, the state's economic development arm also known as ESD, did not sign an NDA for this particular deal, but has worked on others with Amazon in the past and negotiated an "ongoing" NDA with the company long ago, said Holly Leicht, the agency's executive vice president for real estate development and planning.

Officials said a level of confidentiality was needed to ensure New York remained competitive in its talks with Amazon, which is now slated to develop an up to 8 million-square-foot campus along the East River and bring at least 25,000 high-paying jobs to the city.

"When we’re competing with so many other cities and states, we are within our rights in the law to withhold some information that really impairs our ability to compete and win the job," ESD President and CEO Howard Zemsky said. "So there’s a balance. But we don’t ever sign away, nor can we, the laws of the state."

The revelation comes amid criticism from elected officials and advocates that Mayor Bill de Blasio and Gov. Andrew Cuomo negotiated the deal with Amazon in secret. The company's move to New York is bolstered by the nearly $3 billion in tax breaks and grants.

Some politicians who initially signed a letter encouraging Amazon to pick New York have recently slammed the deal, with some saying they didn't imagine such big tax breaks.

The Amazon project was unique both in its high profile and the fact that the firm publicly solicited proposals for its new home, officials said.

But it's "not uncommon" for companies to seek an NDA when negotiating economic development deals, said James Patchett, the EDC's president and CEO. He said all 238 cities that submitted bids to Amazon signed an agreement, though the company did not confirm that.

"They wanted to make sure that their decisions were held in confidence," Patchett said. "They actually kept it quite quiet within the company, even, to the point where there were I think a very limited number of folks who were in the loop on the conversation."

Officials' communications with Amazon are still subject to disclosure under the state's Freedom of Information Law and the project will move forward with a "very public conversation" about what it should look like and how it will affect the surrounding community, Patchett said.

But the secrecy of the Amazon deal has led critics of the project to argue for limiting the future use of NDAs in New York.

State Sen. Michael Gianaris, who represents Long Island City, proposed legislation last week that would ban governments from entering into such agreements at the behest of companies that are in economic development negotiations. City Councilman Brad Lander (D-Brooklyn) has said he will introduce similar legislation to prevent the city from participating in any other bidding process that requires an NDA.

"The secretive process surrounding the Amazon deal sets a dangerous precedent that must be prohibited so that our government answers to the people, not wealthy corporations," Gianaris, a Democrat, said in a statement Friday.

(Lead image: Amazon packages are seen in England in November 2018. Photo by Leon Neal/Getty Images)