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Post by mikecubs on Feb 12, 2020 7:52:00 GMT -6
Sternberg meets with Tampa officials about shared-city Rays plan, it’s working, it’s wooooorking, mwuahaha!Posted on February 11, 2020 by Neil deMause Tampa Bay Rays owner Stu Sternberg, taking advantage of his newly confirmed right to talk before 2028 about moving the Rays out of St. Petersburg (but not to talk about moving the Rays out of St. Petersburg before 2028), met for 2.5 hours yesterday with Tampa Mayor Jane Castor and Hillsborough County Commissioner Ken Hagan about splitting the team between new stadiums in Tampa and Montreal, and also not splitting the team between new stadiums in Tampa and Montreal: “The goal is to try and have an agreement with all three entities [the Rays, Tampa, and Hillsborough County] by the end of the year. It’s extremely aggressive. However, having gone through the last several-year exercise, I appreciate the sense of urgency and the goal of trying to reach an agreement as quickly as possible,” said Hagan, who led the talks with the team for the proposed $892 million stadium in Ybor City before they broke down in December 2018…. Castor agreed, but said she hadn’t given up hope for keeping the Rays for the entire 162-game season. “The focus was on the split season, but I don’t think the full season is off the table yet,” Castor said.And Hagan added: “ I am still hopeful that we can go back to the original model and framework of an entire season in Ybor City,” said Hagan. “I take the Rays at their word. Right now we are only considering a split season concept.”Whether this whole Tampontreal Ex-Rays plan is serious or a lavishly orchestrated bluff, you’ll note that it’s working out pretty well for Sternberg: He’s gone in just one year from even his own commissioner saying he was stuck playing in St. Petersburg to suddenly getting to hold stadium talks with cities in two nations. If it lands him a new stadium in Tampa, great; if it lands him a new stadium in Montreal but not one in Tampa, he can go to the public and MLB and say, “Hey, I tried with Tampa, they didn’t hold up their end of the deal, Quebec ho!”; if it lands him new stadium offers in both, he can either pick one or go ahead with his cockamamie scheme. And if lands him nothing, well, at least he’s no worse off than where he started. Castor and Hagan said the goal is for a deal for a Tampa stadium to be in place by the end of the year, which is a meaningless deadline since it can be extended at any time, but does provide the three parties a nice way to turn up their crisis inducers. Castor noted that “the citizens’ appetite of paying for a stadium is about zero at this point,” which is a sticking point, but there are enough creative ways to fund a stadium without making it look like citizens are paying for it when they really are — tax breaks, tax increment financing districts, free land deals, “infrastructure” spending, hey-look-over-there-what’s-that — that you know they’ll come up with something to try. Noah Pransky, you have anything to add? Ayep. Throw another data point on the fire for “Stuart Sternberg, not so much crazy as crazy like a fox.” Shadow of Stadium @stadiumshadow “The #Rays were extremely transparent,” Hillsborough Commissioner Ken Hagan said after the meeting, without addressing how he expected the $600M(?) park to be funded. Hagan previously failed to find $$ in the 3yrs he spent trying to make a full-season Tampa location happen. … Charlie Frago ✔ @charliefrago And the Rays stadium saga opens another chapter: In Mayor Jane Castor's conference room. @tb_Times www.tampabay.com/news/tampa/202www.fieldofschemes.com/2020/02/11/15767/sternberg-meets-with-tampa-officials-about-shared-city-rays-plan-its-working-its-wooooorking-mwuahaha/#comments
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Post by mikecubs on May 28, 2020 15:15:06 GMT -6
A’s may delay, alter future Oakland ballpark planby Kevin Reichard on May 28, 2020 in Major-League Baseball, News A planned new Oakland ballpark plan for Howard Terminal may end up being delayed or even scrapped, as the COVID-19 pandemic and underlying economic uncertainty will certainly impact facility planning for the Athletics.
The Athletics have proposed a multiuse development at Howard Terminal, on the downtown Oakland waterfront, anchored by a new ballpark, with an opening date of 2023. That would be an ambitious opening date even under normal circumstances, but these are normal times. There’s tremendous stress on the economy right now, and we’ll see plenty of talk about the future of venue design in coming months as the United States works on pandemic-mitigation plans. Committing to a new ballpark, especially one that us part of a billion-dollar-plus development, is certainly a leap of faith. Which is why the A’s are reviewing plans for a 2023 opening, per the San Francisco Chronicle: But Wednesday, Catherine Aker, the team’s vice president of communications and community relations, told me in an email exchange, “The timeline may be adjusted due to the COVID-19 pandemic.” Don’t be surprised if the idea of a new ballpark at the Oakland Coliseum site is revived under the circumstances. The A’s have released a broad vision for that project that includes tearing down RingCentral Coliseum and replacing it with a small sports park/amphitheater, retaining Oakland Arena as an event venue, and redeveloping the surrounding the land with mixed-use amenities. It would be a lot cheaper to build a new ballpark next to the Coliseum, tear down the Coliseum and then redevelop the area with those mixed-use amenities, dropping the notion of a sports park. Plan B may eventually become Plan A. ballparkdigest.com/2020/05/28/as-may-delay-alter-future-oakland-ballpark-plan/
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Post by mikecubs on Jun 26, 2020 0:37:43 GMT -6
Pretty cool video on the history of the Oakland Coliseum and why it still exists
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Post by mikecubs on Jun 30, 2020 4:20:28 GMT -6
Sierra Club: Build A’s ballpark at Coliseum site, not Howard Terminalby Kevin Reichard on June 29, 2020 in Major-League Baseball, News New Oakland Athletics Ballpark Renderings May 2019 The Sierra Club’s San Francisco Bay Chapter is recommending the Oakland Athletics build a new ballpark at the current Coliseum site, arguing that there are too many environmental issues associated with a Howard Terminal waterfront location. With the Oakland Coliseum clearly not the long-term home of the Athletics, the team had been promoting a plan for a privately financed ballpark a the downtown waterfront Howard Terminal site, and a key economic component of that plan was generating future revenue from a redeveloped Coliseum site. But last month the Athletics said the Howard Terminal plan may end up being delayed or even scrapped, which could launch a new plan to build a new ballpark next to the Coliseum, tear down the Coliseum and then redevelop the area with mixed-use amenities. And that’s the path recommended by the Sierra Club, which is warning about significant environmental justice impacts on West Oakland residents if a Howard Terminal ballpark comes to be. “The Coliseum site is already approved for use as a stadium, is transit accessible, and would lift up surrounding East Oakland neighborhoods rather than displacing maritime businesses and workers,” said Igor Tregub, Chair of the Sierra Club’s Northern Alameda County Group, in a press statement. “Howard Terminal, on the other hand, has less transit access and is vulnerable to sea-level rise.” The two main arguments against the Howard Terminal site: the lack of mass transit serving the site and the environmental issues involved with developing what’s essentially a brownfield site. The transit issues and increased greenhouse gas emissions can be addressed with city cooperation, but there’s no doubt there’s a better arrangement at the Coliseum site when it comes to mass transit. The bigger issue is the environmental status of the Howard Terminal site: it’s a dirty industrial site where there are known land toxins currently contained under a cap. With no clear plan for remediation and the possibility the site would remain capped, there’s the potential of a large mixed-use development disturbing the existing cap. A site like Howard Terminal is extremely challenging, to say the least.The next step in the A’s ballpark saga: continued negotiations to close on a purchase of the Coliseum site. ballparkdigest.com/2020/06/29/sierra-club-build-as-ballpark-at-coliseum-site-not-howard-terminal/
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Post by mikecubs on Jul 14, 2020 10:39:19 GMT -6
OAKLAND A’S ‘STILL 100-PERCENT COMMITTED’ TO NEW BALLPARK SITEThe coronavirus may have slowed the Oakland A’s pursuit of a new ballpark at the Howard Terminal site on the San Francisco Bay, west of downtown Oakland, but it hasn’t dampened their commitment. The ballclub is “still 100-percent committed” to what may eventually become a more than $2 billion mostly privately-funded, multi-use project on two sites that sit six miles apart, even if the ballpark’s opening is delayed well-beyond the 2023 season as originally anticipated, A’s president Dave Kaval told Sportico in an exclusive interview. “We love our plan down there for the ballpark itself, as well as the adjacent residential and retail areas around it,” Kaval said. “We think it can be a positive economic catalyst for Oakland and the waterfront, the same thing that happened in San Francisco with Oracle Park.” The home of the San Francisco Giants cost the club $357 million of its own money. It turned 20 years old this year, and has already been paid off. Few folks remember it took two decades and votes in three different cities from concept to the first game in the then-new facility. Similarly, John Fisher and his family bought the A’s in 2005 for $180 million, and the quest for a new park has traveled locally since then—from Fremont to San Jose to the current Coliseum grounds and on to the Howard Terminal. That 54 acres of pavement was once a port of delivery for pineapples shipped from Hawaii and currently is inhabited by the carcasses of truck compartments, just north of famous Jack London Square. In San Diego, it took nine years from concept to the 2004 opening of Petco Park, at the cost of $456 million, $153 million contributed by the San Diego Padres. “The city did pretty well,” said John Moores, the former Padres owner who piloted the project. “It made two or three times the debt service on the bonds. It’s been pretty phenomenal. It exceeded anything we would ever have thought. I’m sure the Giants have the same story.” In Oakland, the plan now is for the A’s to redevelop the Coliseum area into a mixed-use project around Oracle Arena, with the ballpark being reduced to a baseball field surrounded by green space, apartments and retail outlets. That 120-acre parcel where the A’s have played since they moved west from Kansas City in 1968 is jointly-owned by the City of Oakland and County of Alameda and cost $25.5 million in 1960s dollars to build out. The County has already sold its portion to the A’s for $85 million, and after a lawsuit and some acrimony, negotiations have just begun with the city. Starved financially dealing with the coronavirus crisis, the Oakland City Council voted late last month to explore selling at a similar price.It’s a gargantuan project on the two sites, that includes a 34,000-seat stadium with a roof-top green space designed by the Bjarke Ingels Group, a firm headquartered in New York and Copenhagen with no prior ballpark design experience. The team is still determining the overall cost, but Fisher has an estimated net worth of $3.3 billion while the team is valued at $1.1 billion, so there are resources, but yet no partners. If it happens, the timeline from concept to first game will also be close to 20 years. The 2023 projected opening now seems problematic at best. “ We’re just taking it quarter by quarter. It’s really up to the city,” Kaval said. “It’s how they prioritize the timing of the project and its approval. So, obviously, the COVID has affected the timeline. But the project is not at a standstill. It’s important to know we’re making progress, too.”There’s always opposition to these projects. For example, in San Diego, former city councilman Bruce Henderson filed 16 nuisance lawsuits, taking each of them to the State Supreme Court, losing at every level. “They were very effective, and they cost us a ton of money,” Moores recalled. “We lost two years. [The lawsuits] never had a chance to succeed, but that wasn’t the point.” Last week the Sierra Club in Northern California sent a letter to the Oakland City Council saying the A’s project wasn’t environmentally sound and urged the club to build at the Coliseum. Kaval objected, citing the fact that the A’s will privately mitigate any environmental damage on the Howard Terminal property, plus build the stadium four feet higher to accommodate the anticipated rise of the sea level by 2100. “This is a very positive green project,” he said. “It’s environmentally very forward. It’s greenhouse grass neutral. It’s going to improve the air quality in west Oakland. We’re taking a marine terminal and turning it into 18 acres of open park space. That’s a big win for the community. And to do it on private dollars? That’s another big win for everybody.” www.sportico.com/2020/leagues/baseball/oakland-as-still-100-percent-committed-to-new-ballpark-site-1234608993/
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Post by mikecubs on Jul 14, 2020 11:01:51 GMT -6
new a's park renderings
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Post by mikecubs on Feb 14, 2021 14:14:31 GMT -6
A’s prevail in Howard Terminal lawsuit; still, construction likely delayedby Kevin Reichard on February 11, 2021 in Minor-League Baseball New Howard Terminal rendering (1) A lawsuit seeking to derail a new Howard Terminal ballpark for the Oakland A’s has been dismissed, but there is still real damage nevertheless: it looks like there’s little chance of a 2023 opening for the downtown facility. A coalition of shipping, steel, and trucking companies filed a lawsuit in Alameda County Superior Court in March opposing an application submitted by the A’s to Governor Gavin Newsom’s Office of Planning and Research. Essentially, Alameda County Superior Court Judge Noel Wise ruled against the coalition, concluding that the A’s and the state of California met all criteria for an expedited environmental review. Still, it took almost a year for the Athletics to prevail, which undercuts the whole point of an expedited environmental review. A nd while the coalition of Howard Terminal business may not have won an ultimate victory, they did end up delaying the project. Once eyed for a 2023 opening, it now looks like the project could slip into 2024–assuming things go smoothly from here. From the Mercury News: “We were going to try to open by 2023. That’s obviously slipped,” A’s president Dave Kaval said in a phone conversation Wednesday. “How far it slipped, I can’t answer that. I don’t know yet. It depends on if the city can even get this to a vote this year. It depends on the other priorities the city council might have.”… So, Kaval and the A’s can move forward. But even if the case went their way, the damage was done. A year sorting through this lawsuit tightens the project’s already-ambitious timeline. “This was completely a 100% roadblock,” Kaval said. “We are concerned about the timeline and pace of progress because of COVID and the lawsuit. It’s great that we’re off the lawsuit and we’re moving forward. But you know, I think the timelines nonetheless are one of the biggest challenges that we face with the project right now.” And, as legal eagles know, a delay also raises the chances that circumstances can change, so plaintiffs can always win by losing. Indeed, they did: with local officials preoccupied with fighting the pandemic, more likely less attention will be paid to the steps needed to actually begin construction of the ballpark. The A’s still need to file an Environmental Impact Report for city approval, and also close on a deal to buy the half of the Oakland Coliseum site controlled by the city. The A’s say they need funds generated by an Oakland Coliseum development to make the Howard Terminal site work. But with former A’s pitcher Dave Stewart submitting a $115-million bid to buy the city’s share–far above the $85-million bid by the A’s–that may end up being a complicating issue as well. ballparkdigest.com/2021/02/11/as-prevail-in-howard-terminal-lawsuit-still-construction-likely-delayed/
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Post by mikecubs on Feb 14, 2021 14:16:35 GMT -6
no surprise, even without the lawsuit absolutely nothing was going to get done until covid is taken care of. Same thing with the Blue Jays and their new park plans
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Post by mikecubs on Mar 5, 2021 7:59:04 GMT -6
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Post by mikecubs on Mar 27, 2021 23:53:20 GMT -6
A’S BALLPARK PROJECT HEADING TOWARD OAKLAND CITY COUNCIL APPROVALThe Oakland A’s are heading down the homestretch in their pursuit of building a new stadium and ballpark village at the Howard Terminal site on the San Francisco Bay, west of downtown Oakland. “ We’re just focused on getting the Oakland City Council to vote sometime this year,” A’s president Dave Kaval said in a recent exclusive interview. “No more delays. We really want this voted on. We feel we have a great project. We really need to know this year, so we can make plans and open the stadium as soon as possible.”Of course, it’s never that simple. This past Feb. 26, the A’s filed and Oakland published a Draft Environmental Impact Report (DEIR) on how the still unspecified multi-billion dollar cost of the project will affect the proposed site. That opened a 45-day period for any member of the public to submit comments on the report, which originally was to end April 12 but has now been extended another 15 days beyond that. The A’s ballpark situation has long been a critical Major League Baseball problem, along with the now dormant stadium situation in Tampa Bay. But pending litigation, the eight-member Oakland City Council could soon give approval to a preliminary development agreement, allowing shovels to be turned sometime early in 2022. Because of delays in the process caused by the coronavirus, the once-projected 2023 opening now seems problematic at best.“Yes, once we get approval from the City Council, that’s really the last political step to move forward,” Kaval said. “We already have the Port of Oakland approval. We already have the State of California approval. So, this is really the big thing.” Asked when he thought the vote could be taken, Kaval responded: “I’m hoping late summer or early fall, but it’s really in the city’s hands. We’re pushing them. We want to make sure everything is done in a manner that makes sense. We’ve already been working on this for three years. But that’s a question better asked of them than me.”Welcome to northern California. A similar process unfolded for the current home of the San Francisco Giants, completed at the cost of $357 million of the Giants’ own money. That project took 20 years, and votes in three different cities, from concept to the first game in the now 20-year-old facility. John Fisher and his family bought the A’s in 2005 for $180 million, and the quest for a new park has moved from Fremont to San Jose to the current Coliseum grounds and on to the Howard Terminal. That 54 acres of pavement was once a port of delivery for pineapples shipped from Hawaii and currently is dormant, inhabited by the carcasses of shipping containers, just north of famous Jack London Square. It’s envisioned that the parcel will be home to a 35,000-seat, state-of-the-art ballpark, 3,000 apartment units, 1.5 million square feet of commercial space, 270,000 square feet of retail space, a 400-room hotel, a smaller entertainment venue to accommodate 3,500, and tons of open parks, including green space on the roof of the stadium, according to architectural plans provided by the A’s. Advocates say the construction will revitalize Jack London Square in Oakland, much like how the ballpark in San Francisco rejuvenated the China Basin District in San Francisco, turning it into a vital business and entertainment hub. For that reason, Oakland Mayor Libby Schaff is firmly in favor of the project, in no small part because the A’s are the East Bay’s last pro sports team, given the relocation of the NBA’s Golden State Warriors to San Francisco and the NFL’s Raiders to Las Vegas last year. “I’m excited about keeping our A’s rooted in Oakland,” the Mayor said in a statement on the day the DEIR was published, echoing the A’s own promotions about their commitment to remain. “The Howard Terminal requires the highest environment standards while giving us an opportunity to expand our entertainment district near Jack London Square, increase housing, provide good jobs, and keep our beloved waterfront working.” The A’s have committed to fund and mitigate any environmental problems identified on the 54-acre parcel, plus elevate the entire construction project to ward off the possibility of sea level rise so close to an estuary that connects to the San Francisco Bay. There’s still opposition to the project from within the city. A group called The East Oakland Stadium Alliance is in favor of keeping the team in a new facility on the Oakland Coliseum site, where the team has played in the same stadium since it moved from Kansas City to Oakland in 1968. The A’s studied that possibility, but opted instead on the Howard Terminal site, pledging to redevelop the Coliseum area as well. That 120-acre parcel where the A’s play was originally jointly owned by the City of Oakland and County of Alameda and cost $25.5 million in 1960s dollars to build out. The County has already sold its stake in the land to the A’s for $85 million. After a lawsuit and some acrimony, the team is continuing negotiations to purchase the city’s portion. The Oakland City Council, its budget hit hard by the coronavirus crisis, voted late last year to explore selling its stake at a similar price to the county’s. It’s a gargantuan project on the two sites, designed by the Bjarke Ingels Group, a firm headquartered in New York and Copenhagen that has no prior ballpark design experience. The team is still determining the overall cost, but Fisher is worth $3.3 billion and the A’s $1.1 billion, so there are resources. If it happens, the timeline from concept to first game will also be close to 20 years. The East Oakland Stadium Alliance was granted the 15-day extension of the 45-day period by the Oakland Planning Commission to question the DEIR, making it 60 days in total, but was not particularly happy with that result. “We are disappointed that the city did not meet the community’s request for a 45-day extension,” the group said in a statement obtained by Sportico. “Our partner organizations, community groups, and the public fought for an extension to ensure that community stakeholders have a fair opportunity to analyze the 6,000-page report and address the potential impacts to traffic congestion, public safety, job loss, and threats to Oakland’s maritime industry, among other concerns.” Kaval, meanwhile, says time is of the essence and is pushing for City Council approval. “These things move at a slow pace,” he said. “You have to keep momentum and the pressure on to continue to maintain the goals. There was a slowdown with COVID, but that’s past now. We need to think about the future. This is a multi-billion dollar project. We really want to make it happen.” www.sportico.com/leagues/baseball/2021/as-ballpark-project-heading-toward-final-oakland-city-council-approval-1234625384/
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Post by mikecubs on Apr 25, 2021 6:36:16 GMT -6
Price tag for A’s ballpark project at Howard Terminal comes in at $12 billion; team vows to privately fund $1B to build stadium A’s president Dave Kaval asks Oakland City Council for vote on Howard Terminal; team says project will cost $12 billion, $1 billion privately financed to build ballparkThe Oakland A’s proposed ballpark and development project at Howard Terminal still faces numerous hurdles, but if it does come to fruition, the price tag for the massive endeavor is expected to be $12 billion, according to documents the team released Friday. The A’s also revealed they will privately fund the 35,000-seat ballpark construction at a $1 billion cost, according to the term sheets.The full project development will expand around Howard Terminal and Jack London Square and include 3,000 units of affordable housing,1.5 million square feet of offices and 270,000 square feet of retail space. The project also includes a 3,500-person indoor performance center and a 400-room hotel. The overall cost includes $450 million in community benefits and $955 million in projected general fund revenues. In return, the city of Oakland would allocate $855 million for infrastructure improvements. The A’s also included a non-relocation agreement with Oakland, which means the organization will not engage in any potential relocation outside of the city while the agreement is in place. In a letter to the city with the term agreement, the A’s and president Dave Kaval asked the Oakland City Council to vote on the project. “ We respectfully ask that the Oakland City Council take a vote on our project before summer recess,” Kaval said in a Tweet along with a link to a petition.Mayor Libby Schaaf, who recently proclaimed her support for the project, appears poised to negotiate with the A’s on the amount of public financing involved. “The City is willing to bear its resources to help make this vision a reality; however, today’s proposal from the A’s appears to request public investment at the high end for projects of this type nationwide,” read a statement from Schaaf spokesperson Justin Berton that confirmed receipt of the proposal.The statement declared the city is still “fully committed” to collaborating with the A’s to bring a public-private funding plan to the city council this year.Beyond the mayor’s office, there are still many obstacles facing the A’s as they continue their decades-long quest to finally leave the Coliseum site, where they have called home since the franchise moved from Kansas City in 1968. The facility is one of the most outdated in the league, and in recent years has received nearly as much attention for its plumbing failures and other shortcomings as the success of the team on the field. Tuesday’s game, the A’s 10th win in a row, was delayed by more than 20 minutes when the bank of lights above left field went out. Atop the list of potential hurdles is a 6,000-page Environmental Impact Report that is up for public comment until April 27. In a Planning Commission hearing on Wednesday, the East Oakland Stadium Alliance — a coalition of workers and labor organizers on the waterfront concerned with Howard Terminal’s impact on jobs — asked for an extension to review the document and several commenters criticized the draft EIR for lacking detailed information on affordable housing and how the project would impact the surrounding area. Oakland granted a 15-day extension on April 8. There is also the issue about access to the ballpark. Unlike the Coliseum site, there is no BART station to serve the area. And there are no parking lots in the most recent construction plan. According to reports, the A’s want to retain the rights to develop the Coliseum site, which until two years ago also was the home to the Warriors and the Raiders. In the petition, Kaval noted that, “This project means more than just a ballpark for us and Oakland. … We’ve hosted 200+ community meetings as part of a first-of-its-kind race & equity-driven community benefits process. Our community work is in every corner of the Town: education, youth sports, food insecurity, homelessness, environmental justice, and more. We are prepared to make even more significant investments in Oakland, for the residents & community.” While Schaaf may press the issue on the financing, she has struck a similar tone as Kaval’s in pitching the park. “I want the A’s to remain in Oakland forever. A prominent new home on the waterfront will help keep them here and keep their business a financially viable one well into the future,” she wrote in an op-ed earlier this month. “Major League Baseball has an excellent track record for creating beautiful new ballparks that reinvigorate city centers and spawn new neighborhoods, from San Francisco to Baltimore; we want no less for Oakland.” www.mercurynews.com/2021/04/23/price-tag-for-as-ballpark-project-at-howard-terminal-comes-in-at-12-billion-team-asks-for-oaklands-vote-will-privately-fund-1b-to-build-stadium/
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Post by mikecubs on Apr 25, 2021 6:42:01 GMT -6
a new pic
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Post by mikecubs on Apr 29, 2021 7:52:22 GMT -6
A’s owners plan “privately financed” stadium that would cost Oakland $855maccess_timeApril 26, 2021 personNeil deMause If you’ve been following the agonizingly slow drip of news about the Oakland A’s plans for a new stadium at Howard Terminal on Oakland’s downtown waterfront, you may recall me wondering aloud how much city taxpayers would be on the hook for associated “infrastructure and transportation projects,” which were slated to be paid for by siphoning off future property tax revenues from the stadium district. I took a guess at a $1 billion stadium cost, and speculated that the ultimate public price tag could be $200 million or more, a figure that was later repeated by the San Francisco Chronicle. Well, on Friday the A’s owners released their proposed term sheet for the project, and if you scroll wayyyyy down to Exhibit F, you will find this: Project-generated revenues from the Jack London Infrastructure Financing District are estimated [to include] $360 million to be used to fund off-site infrastructure (e.g., pedestrian grade separation, vehicular grade separation, bike lanes, railroad safety improvements, sidewalk improvements and intersection improvements). And: Project-generated revenues from the Howard Terminal Infrastructure Financing District are estimated [to include] $495 million to be used to fund all on-site infrastructure development costs (e.g., environmental remediation, seismic improvements, backbone utilities, sea level rise improvements, sidewalks/streets, over 18 acres of parks and open space, and a Bay Trail connection. A’s owner John Fisher, in other words, will pay for the construction costs of a baseball stadium and surrounding development — so long as the city coughs up $855 million in tax revenue to take a largely inaccessible industrial district and trick it out with new roads, underpasses and overpasses around highways and train tracks, and protect it from earthquakes and the sea level rise that is set to hit San Francisco Bay extra-hard. You know, $855 million in sundries.This is a very large number, especially for a city that is already facing budget cuts as a result of pandemic-related revenue shortfalls, even after getting partly bailed out by the federal stimulus package. How best to distract people from that kind of an ask? Why, with even larger numbers, of course: Okay, so: The ballpark will indeed cost more than $1 billion in private money to construct, atop all those city-funded sea-level-protection berms and surrounded by city-funded infrastructure (everybody drink!) improvements. That additional $1 billion in “general fund dollars” and $450 million in “community benefits,” though, is a mirage: Those numbers were calculated by adding up all the city revenues that will be diverted by those two new tax increment financing districts, subtracting what the A’s will use, and decreeing what’s left over to be public benefits, even though it’s, you know, public money that normally would go to the public in any case. And while some of the property tax money will be “generated” by the A’s new development — “generated” in scare quotes, because TIFs invariably end up cannibalizing tax revenue that would exist even without the new development that they go to fund — that huge pool of cash would be created by mapping out TIF districts that are flipping ginormous, encompassing not just the new stadium development but much of the already-built-up area around Jack London Square: To her credit, Oakland Mayor Libby Schaaf appears to have read the $855 million fine print, issuing a statement that “The City is willing to bring to bear its resources to help make this vision a reality; however, today’s proposal from the A’s appears to request public investment at the high end for projects of this type nationwide.” Still, that sounds more “Can’t we bring that number down a bit?” than “You’ve got to be kidding me,” in which case this project is looking at certainly hundreds of millions of dollars of infrastructure subsidies, even if Schaaf intends to haggle over the price. Hundreds of millions of dollars sound smaller, though, when compared to numbers in the billions, so expect to see the A’s trying to keep the focus on how much the team would be spending, not on how much in public money it would be asking for. Already, team stadium czar Dave Kaval has already been successful on one front: all the news coverage so far has used the biggest number possible in their headlines, and that’s the $12 billion that team execs say they’ll spend on the overall development, once the stadium gets built, maybe. (The term sheet doesn’t actually require any buildings other than the stadium to be built — and the stadium needs to be built first, and most of the infrastructure would be required to be built before the stadium opens.) Misdirection is the cornerstone of all successful magic. www.fieldofschemes.com/2021/04/26/17341/as-owners-plan-privately-financed-stadium-that-would-cost-oakland-855m/#comments
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Post by ekjet72 on Apr 29, 2021 8:05:43 GMT -6
Sigh, it's the same song and dance everywhere isn't it? Cities which can't afford the bucks both short and long term getting squeezed for more cash, benefits and tax breaks by teams that can. And as always the team and their commissioner will threaten to move. Unfortunately that happened to Oakland with the Raiders so I imagine they are a bit twitchy.
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Post by mikecubs on Apr 29, 2021 8:20:18 GMT -6
Sigh, it's the same song and dance everywhere isn't it? Cities which can't afford the bucks both short and long term getting squeezed for more cash, benefits and tax breaks by teams that can. And as always the team and their commissioner will threaten to move. Unfortunately that happened to Oakland with the Raiders so I imagine they are a bit twitchy. Other than a few rare cases ya. Oakland also lost the Golden State Warriors to San Francisco too so the A's are all that is left.
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