NFL owners are scheduled to vote next Tuesday on a lease for the Raiders’ new Las Vegas stadium … without the team having such an agreement.
The Las Vegas Stadium Authority, the government body negotiating with the Raiders, has said through officials and in meeting minutes that a lease should be secured by the fall.
Nevertheless, the agenda for the NFL owners meeting in downtown Chicago next week includes a vote on the Raiders’ lease.
“In cases such as this, approval is dependent on satisfactory resolution of any open items,” an NFL official said.
But why vote on a lease that is not ready, especially given it has stoked considerable controversy in Las Vegas? The NFL official pointed out that the next owners meeting is in October and that the lease could emerge before then.
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A lease for the Raiders’ Vegas stadium hasn’t been secured, but owners will vote on it anyway.
Rendering: MANICA ARCHITECTURE
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One football official said it appears the league wants to approve a list of terms that it wants in the lease, perhaps giving the Raiders leverage in their talks. In this view, the scheduling of the vote next week is a power move by the NFL, sending a message to the Vegas authorities.
A representative for the Las Vegas Stadium Authority directed calls to the state’s economic development agency. That agency did not reply for comment.
The initial lease that the team filed in late January, with bargain rent and a ban on UNLV from having any branding in the stadium, blew up when benefactor Sheldon Adelson backed away from the proposed stadium.
The Raiders recovered, securing a bank financing pledge and an owners’ vote in March approving their relocation by 2020 to Las Vegas from Oakland. That approval came without a lease, a developer or even the land acquired (the team has since bought the stadium land, though the Stadium Authority needs to approve its use).
There are no indications the team, which did not reply for comment, won’t secure a lease. However, there are some outstanding issues, including the capital improvements budget in future years.
Team owners were told at the March meeting that in addition to the widely publicized $750 million of public financing for the stadium construction, the public is also responsible for $200 million for future stadium improvements.
But Nevada officials have since disagreed that the public tab will rise over $750 million. Nevertheless, NFL officials are working on the basis that there is up to $950 million of public funds.
The fact that the NFL would schedule a vote on a lease far from finished is only the latest example of an expedited process. Owners approved the relocation on March 27 with almost no debate or questions, despite a late stadium push by Oakland. They spent around an hour on the subject.
“I have seen them debate for two hours the height of the uprights,” said one puzzled team official who was in the room when owners voted.
That vote occurred without the lease, and at the time NFL officials suggested the agreement would be ready in April and the document could be approved in May. That approval schedule remains, just without a lease.
The Raiders also still must determine where they will play in 2019. The team plans to play in Oakland through 2018, but its lease there expires at that time.
