Hamilton's Amazon bid comes in with a price tag of $467K

The city of Hamilton's bid to woo Amazon came in at nearly $467,000.

That was lower than the original target of $500,000, but left the city with a shortfall of about $42,000 beyond what has been raised by private donations and the city's $250,000 contribution.

And another $40,000 worth of work wasn't counted in that total. It went into gathering information that the city says is "required to support regular business" but was used in the Amazon bid.

Amazon plans to spend $5 billion on Amazon HQ2, which will bring 50,000 jobs over 10 years. More than 100 North American cities said they intended to try to become the place Amazon picked.

The city has raised $175,000 so far in private donations. Who contributed to the bid?

• $25,000 each from housing developer Movengo, the Burlington Economic Development Corp., Niagara Region Economic Development, FirstOntario Credit Union and McMaster University.
• $40,000 from Hamilton International Airport, Ltd.
• $10,000 from Liuna Local 837.

A city report about the costs and donations notes that parts of the proposal are general enough that the material can be used elsewhere for city promotion and economic development.

What did the money go to?

Among the big-ticket expenses that went into the bid:

• $211,000 to PriceWaterhouse Coopers for major project components and research.
• $2,544 to Monster Truck, and another $2,544 to Dine Alone Records, for the use of the song, "Don't Tell Me How To Live" in the city's video.
• About $111,000 to marketing agency Cundari.

The city is still looking to fundraise the remaining $42,000 to cover the shortfall by the end of 2017.

The additional $40,000 the city isn't counting in the shortfall went to gathering workforce data, photography that city communications and marketing departments will use and infrastructure information about water and sewers that the water department will use.

"These costs have not been included in the Amazon-related costs as a result of the on-going value to the corporation," the report says.

City manager Chris Murray said in October that the bid won't cost more tax dollars than planned.

Amazon expects to announce a winning city early next year.