Amazon’s Humboldt Project Meets Rowdy Opposition at First Public Meeting

The audience at the Azalea Hall public meeting.

Hatred of Amazon was in full force during the first public meeting on the company’s plans to build a delivery center in McKinleyville, with accusations ranging from labor exploitation to plastics pollution.

Allegations like those are irrelevant to the project’s land use review but that didn’t stop the capacity audience at the April 29 meeting at Azalea Hall from making them.

One speaker said Amazon is “anti-union” and is a socially irresponsible company that only cares about “money, money, money.”

Another urged the county not to “support corruption” by approving the project.

One woman alleged that an Amazon worker at an Oregon fulfillment center “dropped dead” on the job and supervisors disregarded it and ordered co-workers to “continue their work around his body for a whole hour before paramedics arrived.”

That prompted a response from Amazon Economic Development Policy Manager Stephen Maduli-Williams, who said medical attention was given immediately and warned against “spreading misinformation.”

The meeting got off to a rowdy start, with Planning Director John Ford’s responses to questions clipped by interruptions.

“You know, I get letters with all sorts of expletives and I’ve been flipped off before but I expected more from McKinleyville, frankly,” he said at one point.

When things temporarily calmed down Maduli-Williams proceeded with a presentation on the project.

On multiple parcels in the McKinleyville Airport Business Park, Amazon seeks to develop a 40,290 square-foot “commercial warehouse” that will intake deliveries from fulfillment centers.

The facility won’t warehouse products, only receive and deliver them to area residents in “Amazon-branded” vehicles.

The delivery station will operate 24 hours a day and be staffed with 227 employees making starting wages of $20 to $23 an hour, with annual payroll topping $8 million.

There will be 115 to 172 vehicle trips per day, the majority of them delivery vans.

In addition to what was described as the “competitive pay,” Amazon workers will get “full benefits” and “career advancement” opportunities.

Maduli-Williams said the company has invested $2.5 billion since 2019 in what was described as the company’s “safety and operations excellence.”

The presentation was derided by audience members, with one saying it was “like listening to a computer trying to entice me to join their company.”

Asked why the McKinleyville site was chosen, Maduli-Willaims said it’s zoned for the project and Ford said Amazon “provides a service that there’s obviously a demand for.”

Speaking over interruptions, Ford added, “I understand there are people who just don’t like Amazon but if it this didn’t have the name Amazon on it, would it be such a volatile discussion?”

“Yes,” several audience members shouted.

There was more shouting and “particularly” addressing “the person in back who’s been calling me names,” Ford said the behavior wasn’t a “good representation” of the community.

Criticism of Amazon also included allegations of sharing customer data with the federal government and “dangerous and psychologically damaging working conditions.”

Others questioned the project location, with one woman saying the 32-foot high delivery warehouse will “stick out like a sore thumb.”

Another asked the county to “consider what kind of employers we’re allowing into our community” and urged people to “draw the line” and oppose the project.

The only speaker in support of the project said it will “allow Humboldt’s economy to grow.”

The meeting is the first in a series, with release of a draft Environmental Impact Report (EIR) expected in September followed by release of a final EIR in January and Planning Commission review in February.