By J. Graber | Scottsdale Independent
Axon’s plan to officially break ground on its proposed $1.3 billion global headquarters campus near the intersection North Hayden Road and the Loop 101 Jan. 10 has been canceled, and founder and CEO Rick Smith has started looking at other sites in Texas and Florida to build the facility.
That does not mean the possibility of building the campus in Scottsdale is dead though, Smith said.
“It’s not dead but it’s in limbo,” Smith said. “It’s been in limbo before, and it’s back in limbo and I would say we’re getting to the point of, I would say, fatigue where we’ve got to drive this to a resolution.
“If the city and the powers that be work with us to get this resolved in 2025, great, I think it’s still salvageable, but it’s trending in the wrong direction,” he continued.
The Scottsdale City Council voted 5-2 to rezone a portion of the 74-acre lot during its Nov. 19 meeting to make way for the campus that was set to include a 401,085-square-foot world headquarters, along with 1,895 one-, two- and three-bedroom apartments and condominiums; five five-story retail buildings; one three-story retail building; and a 435-key hotel. It is also supposed to have seven restaurants on site.
But former Scottsdale Councilman Bob Littlefield joined forces with California-based union Unite Here, which has offices in Arizona, and began the day after the vote gathering enough signatures to push the issue to a referendum.
Littlefield and his allies needed to gather 15,135 signatures to take the original rezoning request out of the hands of council and put it before the voters on the ballot, but gathered almost 27,000.
Scottsdale City Clerk Ben Lane and the Maricopa County Recorder’s office has until Feb. 12 to certify the signatures.
