Pittsburghers gathered outside the City’s and Heinz Endowment’s “P4 Conference” to highlight the hypocrisy of talking about inclusion, equity, and a city for all while offering billions on incentives to attract Amazon HQ2 to the city.
Amazon HQ2 stands against everything the P4 says it supports and against the interests of the hundreds of thousands of residents that call Pittsburgh home now.
A couple of hundred tech jobs moving to East Liberty caused massive displacement.
If we call what happened in East Liberty a tragedy, then bringing Amazon here is a crime.
A few hundred tech jobs in East Liberty created a crisis of housing speculation, gentrification and displacement. Imagine that 50 or 100 times over, and our city will have a housing crisis and the displacement of tens of thousands of residents in a matter of a few years.
Amazon HQ2 will exacerbate the already existing housing crisis, push transit dependent riders to areas with little to no bus service, make the city unlivable for most of the residents who are here, and will privilege the new, wealthy, tech workers who will be relocating here at the expense of long time residents.
Questions the city doesn’t seem to have answers for: Who will be prioritized for transit infrastructure projects? Will they be projects that increase connectivity for tech workers, or ones that create better connectivity for seniors and low income workers that depend on public transit?
#Amazonhasnohomehere!