Irwindale Makes $115-Million Pass at Raiders

After weeks of hard bargaining with Los Angeles Raiders owner Al Davis and other team officials, the city of Irwindale has made a formal offer to loan the professional football team $115 million to carve a 65,000-seat stadium out of an old rock quarry, and to construct a practice field and corporate headquarters in the tiny industrial town.

The Raiders have explored a number of playing alternatives since plans collapsed in April for a $17-million seating reconfiguration, including luxury suites, in the team’s present home, the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum.

In a letter sent Tuesday to Davis, consultants for the east San Gabriel Valley city detail an offer of $1 million in up-front cash and $19 million within 120 days after the city has secured financing. The $95-million balance will be paid once the stadium is under construction.

“Mr. Davis is a tough negotiator, but we feel no one can match what we can offer,” said Xavier Hermosillo, the city’s press spokesman. “We’re in the best economic condition of any city that has bid for them up to now.”

Irwindale city officials and a Raiders spokesman Wednesday characterized the negotiations as “serious” but would not discuss in detail the terms of the offer or reveal any potential sticking points.

“It wouldn’t be fair to detail anyone’s position at this point,” said John Herrera, a Raiders administrator. “I can tell you there are some serious proposals from more than one city in front of us and we’re evaluating them.”

But the letter to Davis from Fred Lyte, consultant to Irwindale’s redevelopment agency, reveals that the Raiders owner wants at least $20 million of the loan to be forwarded as a cash advance.

This front money--an inducement to relocate the National Football League team to Irwindale--would be forfeitable in the event the city could not put the deal together.

The letter, which is on file in Irwindale’s City Hall, underscores the city’s refusal to forward any more than $1 million in up-front cash.

Lyte, in asking Davis to “live with our slow but solid approach,” wrote that the city needs to first complete an economic survey and initiate steps to secure public and private financing, which could take up to 120 days.

Raiders administrators insist that their negotiations with other cities are not an attempt to exact more concessions from the Coliseum Commission. The team has a lease to play in that stadium until 1991.

Sources close to the team say Davis has long wanted a stadium he could call his own.

Other cities that have approached the team with offers--and are still rumored in the running--are as widely scattered as New York, Phoenix, Sacramento and Inglewood.

Irwindale--a dusty, pockmarked city of 1,038 residents known for its gravel and rock quarries--has emerged in recent weeks as a strong candidate to land the Raiders, whose training facilities and headquarters are presently located in El Segundo.

Last month, Davis took a helicopter tour of the proposed stadium site, a huge gravel and rock pit adjacent to the 210 Freeway. Engineering consultants then took a closer look to determine the feasibility of building a stadium in an 80-acre, 160-foot-deep pit.

City officials, encouraged by the results of those early contacts, have hired Harrison Price Co. to study the economic benefits of a stadium. The City Council is expected next week to approve preliminary steps for a “Raiders bond issue” on the November ballot.

City officials, who have seen city and redevelopment coffers swell from $25,000 a decade ago to $35 million today through aggressive industrial and corporate redevelopment, are sanguine.

“We took a survey and 91% of the residents who responded wanted the Raiders to come to Irwindale,” Lyte said. “We wouldn’t be going after it if we didn’t think we’d get it.”