Local politicians, at least in NY, are NOT happy. Cuomo's planing to do an end-run around local approvals though. NoVA location is not shocking at all given Amazon has enormous contracts with the federal government for cloud services now.
It's funny, in a way, to see the hopes of all of these mid-sized cities completely dashed in what was a bs search all along while the people in the cities who "won" are largely shouting DEAR GOD NO HOUSING IS ALREADY INSANE HERE!
It's too bad we don't live in a world where one of the wealthiest companies in the world is having to solicit cities with offers for access to their talent pools rather than the other way around. I'm sure the $3B Amazon will be getting could go a long way to improve housing and badly needed infrastructure in those places.