A Seattle Councilperson came to Nashville to talk to a Nashville group about the "Amazon Effect". Since Seattle is the home base of Amazon, that city knows best how Amazon can change a city. Over a 100 people went to the meeting at East Nashville Magnet School. The meeting was organized by Stand-Up Nashville, a group that wants to make sure our money goes to creating opportunities for Nashvillians.
The group says it's worried that Amazon doesn't care about the impact on Nashville housing, jobs, traffic, and transportation. Amazon declined to take part in the meeting.
Theresa Mosqueda sits on the Seattle city council. Mosqueda said, “The hunger games-like approach that Amazon engaged in, in a race to the bottom for competing for jobs, a lot of cities were saying 'I’m concerned about the Seattleization of our city".
She said growth happens so fast in a city with Amazon, that a city ends up playing catch up to build infrastructure and housing to handle it all. She hopes Nashville can avoid the troubles that have hit Seattle:
- soaring housing costs
- homelessness crisis
- displacement of long-time residents