Hotel Del Owner Betting City Will Lose Races : Lawrence Afraid Political Leaders Haven’t the Unity

Few people have offered greater support to Dennis Conner’s bid to recapture the America’s Cup than Larry Lawrence, owner of the Hotel del Coronado. And no one wants San Diego to be the site of the next cup defense more than he does.

Yet Lawrence is betting that San Diego botches it.

“It’s going to take unification . . . and I don’t happen to believe we have the political leadership to carry it off, and I’m very concerned,” said Lawrence, who says having an America’s Cup competition here would be “the most important thing to happen to San Diego since Juan Cabrillo sailed into the harbor.”

Lawrence, who has raised money for Stars & Stripes and donated a pair of boats used as tenders while Conner practiced in Hawaii, said San Diego’s political leaders, including Mayor Maureen O’Connor, lack the vision to see that hosting an America’s Cup is more than worth whatever investment is necessary to bring it here.

“If Miss O’Connor would speak with her husband . . . who’s a businessman, she’d find out you don’t make money without investing money,” said Lawrence, who views the America’s Cup as as a catalyst for transforming San Diego Bay from “the most latent, underdeveloped harbor of its size and stature in the world” to one rimmed with development.

“I don’t have a lot of optimism,” he said. “I don’t see the big thinkers, the expanded minds, the growth advocates. I don’t see the people who are willing to take a chance.”

Lawrence says he’s fearful that the same people who have worked hardest for Stars & Stripes, people like Sail America President Malin Burnham, are tired and can’t be expected to lead the fight for San Diego. “There’s only a handful of people in this town who have had much to do with the raising of these (Stars & Stripes) funds. Most of the money has come from out of town.”

Unlike the single-minded purpose he says guided Australia and turned Fremantle from a “dirty, dingy town” into an attractive seaside city, said Lawrence, it appears that many San Diego political leaders are bogged down in “saying no to growth, ‘We don’t want any more jobs and growth.’ ”

Lawrence bristles at criticism that the America’s Cup is merely a rich man’s sport and that spending taxpayer money for racing facilities in San Diego would benefit only a very few. “This is no longer a rich man’s sport. Most of those guys on the boat are blue-collar people who at most (are getting) $75 a week. That’s a sacrifice.”

As for whether Lawrence is biased because an America’s Cup defense in San Diego would benefit his Coronado hotel, he responds, “The Hotel del Coronado doesn’t need the business. We run 98% (occupancy) year ‘round. What it (the cup in San Diego) means is that San Diego will enter a different aura of growth that few people can comprehend.”