Hillwood Investment Properties reported Monday the city is interested in identifying a site at AllianceFlorida at Cecil Commerce Center for a 1-million-square-foot distribution center from an undisclosed prospect.
In its third-quarter report to the city, Hillwood said the submittal was related to a regional search, but that’s all the information it offered about the prospect.
A 1-million-square-foot distribution center compares with the sizes sought by major retailers or e-commerce companies, such as Amazon.com.
Amazon.com opened two 1-million-square-foot fulfillment centers in Lakeland and near Tampa in 2014. Jacksonville was interested in landing one of those.
The two centers together employ 2,000 people as of August were adding 2,000 more jobs.
Kirk Wendland, executive director of the city Office of Economic Development, said Monday he could not disclose the name of the prospect, saying only “we are one of many sites that they are looking at.”
Asked if Amazon.com might be looking at Jacksonville, Wendland said it was his understanding the company is always looking for sites. “We are certainly always interested, but that is about all I can say.”
Amazon.com did not reply to a phone call or email Monday afternoon.
Hillwood Senior Vice President Dan Tatsch said Monday he didn’t have much more information than what he disclosed in the report.
He said it was “a fairly typical early-stage inquiry for an undisclosed prospect.”
Tatsch said Hillwood, the city and the JAXUSA Partnership economic development division of the JAX Chamber receive such inquiries regularly.
“Generally we are given very little information about the prospect, at least not until the deal materializes into something more substantive,” he said.
He said that has not happened yet with this prospect, to his knowledge.
He said there are several sites at AllianceFlorida that could accommodate a 1-million-square-foot facility.
Hillwood is the city’s master developer at Cecil Commerce Center, a former naval air station. It is developing the property as AllianceFlorida at Cecil Commerce Center.
Hillwood must make quarterly reports to the city. It has a 90-day deadline for the first, second and third quarters and a 150-day deadline for the fourth. That means the Oct. 1-Dec. 31 report won’t be required until the end of May. The third-quarter report was due this week.
Hillwood also reported Monday the unidentified “Project X” it has been courting for AllianceFlorida has chosen another Jacksonville site.
“Project X” is described as a 450,000-square-foot distribution center, expandable to 600,000 square feet of space, to be built-to-suit for a tenant.
Tatsch said Monday the deal has not been announced. He could not identify the prospect because of a confidentiality agreement.
No public announcement about a distribution center that matches the profile has been made since the end of the third quarter, either.
Tatsch said he looks forward to the deal’s formal announcement because it will be positive for the overall Jacksonville industrial market.
Hillwood has been pursuing “Project X” for some time, offering proposals and counterproposals. It said it submitted a “best and final” proposal in the third quarter, which ran July 1 through Sept. 30, before the prospect said it had chosen another location.
That site has not been identified.
Hillwood’s first- and second-quarter reports also referred to a “Project X,” but it was described as a larger center in the first quarter. Then, it was described as a 600,000-square-foot center potentially expandable to 750,000 square feet.
Wendland said Monday he could not comment about that project, either.
The JAX Chamber said Monday it could not comment about either project.
Other highlights in the third-quarter report included that Hillwood:
• Responded to an initial inquiry from a broker for a project seeking about 400,000 square feet of distribution space. Hillwood had not received the formal Request for Proposals by the end of the quarter.
• Responded to a broker inquiry about 250,000 to 300,000 square feet of distribution space. Hillwood has had “intermittent” contact with the prospect since January 2014 and its decision timeframe is uncertain and it has not issued an RFP.
• Responded to an initial inquiry from a broker representing a prospect seeking 500,000 to 1 million square feet of distribution space.
• Responded to a request from the city for a site at AllianceFlorida to accommodate “Project Max” with a 100,000-square-foot requirement, but said the city learned the prospect had been rejected by the company’s senior management.
As master developer, Hillwood has a long-term contract with the city to develop up to 30 million square feet of industrial and retail space at the 4,474-acre Cecil Commerce Center in West Jacksonville.
Hillwood said it continued to work with GE Oil & Gas, one of the largest deals at AllianceFlorida.
GE Oil & Gas is completing work on a 510,000-square-foot manufacturing plant. Hillwood’s quarterly report said it continued to work with The Conlan Co., GE and GE’s design consultants in the build-out of the valve-manufacturing plant.
During the quarter, GE began modifications to the plant’s exterior. It cut openings in the exterior wall panels to install windows for the office areas and released the work on constructing large steel canopies to mark the main entry.
Work began on installing a large gantry crane that will be used to move valve assemblies among the fabrication line and load the finished valves onto trucks.
GE Oil & Gas also completed the design of its steam test facility that will be built throughout the end of 2015 and into 2016.
Exterior paving was completed, “which marked the milestone where rain events should not delay any of their completion activities.”
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