From left: Ada Healy, Vulcan; Wash. Gov. Chris Gregoire; Seattle Mayor Greg Nickels; Seattle City Councilmember Jan Drago; Christopher Persons, Capitol Hill Housing.

Some of Washington state's biggest political names, including Gov. Chris Gregoire and Seattle Mayor Greg Nickels, stuck some spades in a ceremonial sandbox today to mark the latest construction phase of Amazon.com's new office campus in South Lake Union. They were falling over each other to praise Amazon and its giant campus project, which represents a rare bright spot in the local economy. Noticeably absent from the event, however, was Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos, or any other top Amazon executive for that matter.

"There's not a lot going on in a lot of our industries. Today we're celebrating one company that's doing well," Nickels said. Amazon, he said, "has revolutionized how we shop, how we do retail in this country and around the world."

Paul Allen's Vulcan Inc., which is heading up the campus project, actually started construction a year ago, but held the ceremony today to mark phase four of the project -- and draw attention to the fact that it's moving ahead in the tough economy.

"This is a good news story," said Ada Healey, Vulcan's vice president of real estate, to a smattering of applause at the start of the event.

The Amazon campus will eventually include 11 buildings totaling 1.7 million square feet of office space and 100,000 square feet of street-level retail. Amazon employees are due to start moving into the complex next year, with all buildings occupied by 2012. The company's current headquarters is the PacMed building on Beacon Hill.

Amazon was represented at the event by corporate communications director Patty Smith, who did not take part in the presentation.

What's up with the no-show by Bezos and crew? Amazon does have first-quarter earnings later this week, but the ceremonial event had a strange feel without any high-level Amazon presence -- like the star attraction had better things to do.