Fort Worth fought to keep American Airlines within its city limits.
At a Fort Worth pre-council meeting on Tuesday, Robert Sturns of the city's economic development department said there was stiff competition for American's new headquarters site within the Metroplex.
In September, American Airlines formalized an agreement to keep its new headquarters in the city it has called home since 1978. The location of the new buildings was revealed during a Dallas/Fort Worth International Airport meeting in late October.
At Tuesday's council meeting the city revealed how much the airline plans to spend. The city says the airline will invest as much as $350 million in the new four building campus. It must spend $200 million of that by the end of 2019 as part of a 15-year economic incentive deal.
The city council will formally approve the incentive deal at its meeting next week.
American's new headquarters will be adjacent to part of its operations in the city of Fort Worth near DFW Airport. American will build the headquarters but DFW Airport will own the buildings and lease the property to American until the year 2114.
"It's a point of bragging rights to say they're part of Fort Worth," said Councilman Jungus Jordan.
American is North Texas' largest employer with 27,000 employees in the area and 100,000 total across the world. More than 1,200 American employees live in the city of Fort Worth, which made keeping American in Cowtown a priority for the council and city staff.
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"It's critical for us," said Mayor Betsy Price. "A lot of jobs at risk should they move and we want to keep that whole campus together, so we're very excited about where this takes us."
The city is giving American $21.25 million in tax incentives as part of the economic incentive deal. The airline will promise to keep at least 4,200 jobs in the city as part of that deal.
American Airlines is still in the process of designing the campus and has several more approvals to go through before everything is finalized. However a spokesman did provide the following statement.
"American is delighted to call Fort Worth home," said spokesman Matt Miller. "We look forward to creating a new headquarters that all 100,000 American Airlines employees will be proud of and a space that brings everyone closer together for greater collaboration as we move ahead with plans to restore American to the greatest airline in the world."
While the airline hasn't said what the new headquarters will look like, John Terrell, vice president for commercial development at the airport, and the mayor did reveal some elements of the plan.
"Part of what we were told they want is the ability to have a corporate campus to get people out and moving and to get them to walk between the other buildings," Price said. "It's a great re-use, adaptation of this flood plain area. It's going to give them the capacity to have a beautiful campus there."
"That entire flood plain they're changing from an undergrowth, really unusable property into an amenity," Terrell said. "It's going to be a real, I think, eye catcher. It's really going to invite folks to walk around. They're putting in trails."
The American campus should be tied into the area's trail system at some point in the future, per Terrell and Price.
In two weeks the city council will vote on recommending the current American headquarters and its training facilities for the Texas Enterprise Zone Program. The program would give American a tax break on the properties, in order to facilitate redevelopment and growth.
According to the city's presentation, if the state does designate the area as enterprise zones the airline will invest more than $160 million. The current headquarters would see $16 to $18 million, while the existing facilities will see $155 million in investments.
"It's a way to get some additional enhancements in those buildings," Price said.
Tarrant County and the Dallas City Council also need to approve the DFW Airport lease with American. Those votes are expected to happen before the end of the year.
