McHenry County Board Chairman Jack Franks named to Amazon headquarters task force

WOODSTOCK – McHenry County Board Chairman Jack Franks has been appointed to a task force looking to bring Amazon’s second headquarters to the Chicago area – and possibly McHenry County.

“I’m excited,” Franks said. “Job creation opportunities like this come around once in a lifetime.”

Gov. Bruce Rauner named Franks to the task force as Amazon seeks bids from cities all over the country to build a massive facility that could bring 50,000 jobs with average salaries of $100,000 to the Chicago area.

Although the chairman is not certain Amazon will chose a patch of land in McHenry County, tech workers here could be beneficiaries of those jobs should Amazon President and CEO Jeff Bezos chose to build its $5 billion facility in the area, Franks said.

“They’re going to need skilled, educated workers,” Franks said. “That’s what we have here.”

In its bid, Amazon is looking for readily available real estate in a large and culturally diverse metropolitan area with a high quality of life, easy access to a major airport, a deep pool of tech workers from which to hire and a strong university system, Franks said.

“Landing Amazon would mean good jobs for the hardworking and highly talented workforce in McHenry County,” Franks said.

A positive of Amazon building in the Chicago area is that there is a heavy concentration of operations, marketing, finance and sales employees to poach from other industries, according to a Bloomberg report.

A negative is that Chicago is one of the few major U.S. cities without a significant tech presence, according to the report.