Amazon officials said Nov. 1 during the roughly 2-hour meeting that the Robinson Ranch property was purchased Oct. 29.
Residents of Round Rock West, which lies directly across from the proposed facility, said they felt the company had gone about acquiring the property and getting community input in the wrong order.
"If you buy Amazon, and you're against this, you need to vote with your dollar," said Round Rock resident Terry Meyers.
Meyers, along with other residents, said she'd had no idea Amazon was interested in the property until she read information from the neighborhood association.
Other residents said the information presented at the meeting seemed curated to provide a specific impression of the project.
In addition to city staff, around 60 community members attended the meeting and requested additional information at a future meeting to avoid what they described as a lack of transparency.
Residents requested any plans for infrastructural or road improvements to the area that would be part of the project, as they said the area around CR 172 and McNeil Road already suffers from high levels of traffic.
Amazon officials also provided site and project specifics that were not previously indicated on the company's Planned Unit Development application submitted to the city of Round Rock Oct. 22.
Amazon's Manager of Economic Development Jessica Breaux said the facility represents a preliminary $250 million in capital improvements to the property, and that construction would not begin for another three to five years.
She also said Amazon officials are seeking to annex the property into the city limits—a mutual goal of the company and city—citing as benefits additional property tax revenue and regulatory oversight.
"We are subject to all of the rules and regulations of the city of Round Rock," Breaux said. "That includes all of the development standards, screening, driveway requirements, landscaping, drainage, all of those things. That also includes behavioral ordinances. If there's an issue, you can call the city of Round Rock and they will come and be able to enforce those ordinances."
Amazon will not seek any tax abatement from the city of Round Rock, meaning all property tax would stay with the city instead of being rebated, she said.
Amanda Brown, Senior Development and Land Use Planner with consulting firm Kimley Horn, said Amazon is seeking a base zoning of light industrial and ultimately annexation, and that the request comes with limitations on use.
"We're going to nail down our use to make sure that nothing else will be able to be built there, or this can be used for anything else that might be really unfriendly next to the neighborhood," Brown said.
Amazon has not provided and additional information on next steps.
Community Impact Newspaper will update this story as new information becomes available.
