This new Amazon facility will be Fresno’s 5th. How many jobs has company brought?

The massive industrial space under construction on Marks and Nielsen avenues that will host Fresno’s fifth Amazon warehouse did not come without some controversy.

It was approved by the City Council in 2024 under the promise of good jobs — and lots of them.

Skeptics of the development, named the Scannell Westgate Industrial Center, warn that increasing automation will mean fewer jobs at Amazon’s Fresno operations. That includes City Councilmember Miguel Arias, who says allowing additional warehouse space on the west side — the city’s most polluted area and one in need of more retail and grocery options — was unnecessary.

“I’d rather the Amazons of the world take an existing distribution center or an existing warehouse in this city and renovate that,” said Arias, whose district includes the new warehouse site.

But Amazon says its track record shows a huge investment in Fresno, and that it can use robotics and create plenty of jobs at the same time.

“Fresno is a great place to live and work and we’re proud to be growing our local footprint,” Amazon spokesperson Austin Stowe said in a statement to The Fresno Bee.

Stowe said the operation at Westgate will not be a fulfillment center, which is the company’s largest type of warehouse. But it’s not yet clear how many new jobs the new operation will create or how much of the 833,000 square feet of the industrial center’s planned building space Amazon will use.

The company will share more information about its future operation at Westgate as it becomes available, Stowe added.

Developed by Indiana-based Scannel Properties, construction on Westgate began last summer. Scannell did not respond to The Fresno Bee’s request for comment, but it appears the first of three buildings planned for the 48-acre site is nearing completion.

What is Amazon’s current footprint in Fresno?

Stowe said Amazon has invested “more than $4 billion” in Fresno County. The company currently has four operations in the area and more than 4,000 employees, he added.

A cluster of Amazon buildings is located at the intersection of Central and Orange avenues on the city’s southern edge, which is also in Arias’ district. Among those is an 855,000-square-foot fulfillment center that opened in 2018. Another 470,000-square-foot building was built there after a local developer reached an agreement in 2022 with south Fresno residents who were concerned about the area’s growing number of warehouses.

That same year, Amazon opened a “last mile” facility on Olive and Clovis avenues in east Fresno. This smaller facility replaced a warehouse near Cedar and Church avenues.

Will Oliver, CEO of the Fresno County Economic Development Corporation, said Amazon’s arrival in Fresno caused existing employers to recalculate wages to compete with the online retail and distribution giant. According to Amazon, its average base pay is now “more than” $23 per hour and total compensation, which includes benefits, is more than $30 per hour.

“For many residents, these jobs offer a steady paycheck, benefits from day one and a path to advancement without requiring a four-year degree,” Oliver said.

Arias says west Fresno residents opposed warehouse, warns of automation

Arias was one of two councilmembers who voted against the Westgate warehouse center in 2024. He told The Bee on Wednesday that west Fresno residents were opposed to the project — especially the African American community.

West Fresno advocate Debbie Darden, who voted against the project as it passed through a city review committee, says the warehouse center served as another example of the city pushing through developments residents didn’t ask for.

“We’re trying to get another grocery store to offset prices at the one major store we have here,” she said, “We only have one.”

She and Arias are both concerned Amazon’s Westgate operation will offer far fewer jobs than it could because of automation: maybe a few hundred instead of thousands. Arias said operations at Amazon’s current Fresno facilities are already “mostly automation.”

The New York Times has reviewed internal Amazon documents and in October reported that executives are hoping robotics could help the company avoid adding 600,000 jobs while doubling sales by 2033.

Amazon told The Bee that story’s premise was “wrong and ignores the facts.”

“The reality is that we’ve been rolling out robotics in our facilities since we acquired Kiva in 2012 and, at the same time, we’ve created more direct and indirect jobs than any company in America — well over 2 million,” Amazon’s statement said.

The company said it uses robotics at its Fresno facilities “in a way that improves the experience for both customers and employees.”

This story was originally published May 31, 2026 at 7:30 AM.

Erik Galicia

The Fresno Bee

Erik is a graduate of the Missouri School of Journalism, where he helped launch an effort to better meet the news needs of Spanish-speaking immigrants. Before that, he served as editor-in-chief of his community college student newspaper, Riverside City College Viewpoints, where he covered the impacts of the Salton Sea’s decline on its adjacent farm worker communities in the Southern California desert. Erik’s work is supported through the California Local News Fellowship program.