St. Louis stadium task force co-head Dave Peacock yesterday said that the group is "making consistent progress" on plans for a $998M open-air riverfront stadium for the Rams, and added that the region is "in charge of its own destiny" to keep the team regardless of Rams Owner Stan Kroenke's efforts to move to L.A., according to David Hunn of the ST. LOUIS POST-DISPATCH. Peacock said that NFL owners and execs have "repeatedly reiterated that St. Louis is still largely in control of its own future -- a point they reinforced in Chicago this week." Hunn notes land acquisition "is ongoing" and the Rams have "submitted tax credit applications to the state, and will soon send another, requesting money to help clean up site pollution, perhaps this week." Both Peacock and St. Louis Mayor Francis Slay have said that they "hope to have a financing package to the city's Board of Aldermen when the legislators return from summer break." Peacock "does not anticipate trouble securing funding from the state." Moreover, he said that he "has been meeting with NFL owners, coast to coast, to ensure they understand" the city's stadium plan (ST. LOUIS POST-DISPATCH, 8/13). The POST-DISPATCH's Jim Thomas writes under the header, "NFL Looking For Certainty In St. Louis." The "fewer holes, glitches or lose ends in financing, land acquisition or potential litigation, the more certainty league owners will feel that a particular stadium project can succeed" (ST. LOUIS POST-DISPATCH, 8/13). The AP's Dave Skretta noted Missouri Gov. Jay Nixon "remains confident in St. Louis as an NFL city," even if Kroenke "succeeds in moving his franchise." Nixon: "Certainly we'd like the Rams to stay there, but if they don't for whatever reason, the bottom line is the NFL has really liked St. Louis as a market" (AP, 8/13). ESPN’s Dan Graziano said while the NFL "may prefer the Rams’ proposal in Los Angeles, of the three teams that want to move, St. Louis is the city that seems to have the best proposal for keeping its team” (“NFL Live,” ESPN2, 8/12).
BAY BRIDGE OVER TROUBLED WATER: In Oakland, Matthew Artz in a front-page piece writes for all their talk about wanting to keep the Raiders in Oakland, "neither the local political establishment nor the team is taking the lead on a plan to make that happen." Conversations this week among NFL owners in Chicago about new stadiums for three teams -- the Chargers, Rams and Raiders -- "are only the latest in which prospects in Oakland were little more than an afterthought." Former Oakland City Council member Ignacio De La Fuente, who led negotiations to bring the Raiders back from L.A. two decades ago, said, "There's no champion to get a stadium deal done. The Raiders haven't worked very hard on it. And neither has the city." Artz writes the city thus far "has been on the losing end of the stadium blame game." Oakland officials reiterated that they "have no intention of matching" the $350M that San Diego "is offering to put toward a new stadium" for the Chargers or the roughly $400M that St. Louis and Missouri are offering the Rams. Unlike her counterpart in San Diego, who has been the point person on a new Chargers stadium, Oakland Mayor Libby Schaaf "has kept a low profile on stadium talks." She "didn't attend a recent meeting with the NFL's top stadium official and has turned over negotiations to an assistant city administrator" (OAKLAND TRIBUNE, 8/13). Oakland Assistant City Administrator Claudia Cappio said that any redevelopment of the O.co Coliseum and Oracle Arena site "will require some sort of public investment in infrastructure like water and sewer lines, roads and, certainly, a long-talked-about upgrade and expansion of the Coliseum BART station" (BIZJOURNALS.com, 8/12).
PUT IT ON THE CHARGE CARD: In San Diego, Dan McSwain wrote under the header, "To NFL, San Diego Stadium Offer Looks Thin." From the perspective of the Chargers and the NFL, the city’s $200M "may look more like a goose egg." That is because San Diego Mayor Kevin Faulconer is "proposing to use 'lease-revenue' bonds." McSwain: "I’d like to be in the room when the mayor explains to the Chargers how suddenly paying upward of $13 million a year is really $200 million in free public cash." Overall, San Diego "may be offering the Chargers a bill, not a gift." McSwain: "Let’s just say I’m skeptical" (SAN DIEGO UNION-TRIBUNE, 8/12).
