County Signals Opposition to Raiders’ Move

Four of the five members of the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors on Tuesday expressed strong opposition to the Los Angeles Raiders’ decision to move to Irwindale and said they may not approve a proposal to use 80 acres of county-leased land for stadium parking.

While the county staff was ordered to report back within two weeks on all aspects of the parking proposal, Supervisor Deane Dana said approval may never even come to a supervisorial vote. Raiders owner Al Davis has said obtaining the parking site is a requirement of the Irwindale deal, but Irwindale officials say the county-leased parcel is only one possible location.

Dana noted that the Army Corps of Engineers owns the land in question. He said the director of the county’s Department of Parks and Recreation, Ralph S. Cryder, already has told him it is highly unlikely the corps will ever approve use of the land for parking, thus removing any need for the supervisors to decide.

Only Supervisor Pete Schabarum remained noncommittal on the Raiders’ move Tuesday. He said he realizes he is “between a rock and a hard place” because he is a member of the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum Commission, operator of the facility that stands to lose the team, and at the same time represents Irwindale and nearby San Gabriel Valley communities.

The other supervisors were caustic about both the move and use of the land for parking.

Ed Edelman said he has no desire to help Irwindale profit at the expense of the Coliseum and the economically depressed community around it. Kenneth Hahn called the proposed parking site a potential flood area and wondered whether the county might be liable should autos be swept away by floodwaters. Dana said every taxpayer in the county “should be genuinely concerned” at the huge amounts Irwindale is spending to help the Raiders build a new stadium.

The board chairman, Mike Antonovich, charged that the Raiders-Irwindale deal constitutes “a giveaway of hundreds and hundreds of millions of dollars to enable a team to move from one part of the county to another.”

He said that if the parking and other parts of the deal do not go through, he remains hopeful the Raiders may decide to stay in the Coliseum.

That remark, and similar expressions of hope from others, drew a sharp retort later from Xavier Hermosillo, an Irwindale city spokesman and one of three principal Irwindale negotiators with the Raiders.

“Now that the Raiders have emphatically stated that they’re going to leave the Coliseum, the choice before the Board of Supervisors is a very clear one,” Hermosillo declared. “Do you keep the Raiders in Los Angeles County or do you scuttle the Raiders-Irwindale deal and risk them leaving for Sacramento, Oakland, New York or Arizona?”

Hermosillo pointed out that Irwindale is offering the county $400,000 a year in parking revenue for use of the 80 acres.

But Edelman said he is unimpressed by the offer. He questioned whether the county would not lose far more than that in Coliseum revenue if the Raiders move.

Meanwhile, a Raiders negotiator, John Herrera, said the team will not involve itself in the Irwindale-county debate over the parking site.

“We’ll let Irwindale handle that end of it,” he said. But Herrera went on to say that Davis will be free to walk away from the Irwindale deal, and take the city’s $10-million cash advance with him, if Irwindale fails to obtain Corps of Engineers and county approval of the parking plan.

The city faces a Nov. 4 deadline, according to its agreement with the Raiders, and Herrera said, “We’ll have to see if the City of Irwindale can produce the necessary land there to make the deal.”

Irwindale negotiator Fred Lyte expressed a different view. “Technically, Al (Davis) could scuttle the whole thing if we don’t get the corps land,” he said. “But we think he would stay and try to find an alternative.”

A Corps of Engineers spokesman, John Rasco, said Tuesday that the corps has yet to be formally notified that anyone wants the land. He said corps officials are puzzled why they have heard nothing.

In other developments:

- Los Angeles City Councilman Zev Yaroslavsky introduced a motion that the three Los Angeles representatives on the Coliseum Commission be directed to work to put the Coliseum complex under private management.

- County supervisors approved a motion by Edelman asking the county’s chief administrative officer, Richard B. Dixon, and County Counsel De Witt Clinton to report within four weeks on a series of questions as to whether the Coliseum Commission is satisfactorily organized and whether it ought to be put under one agency rather than be composed of three representatives each from the city, the county and the state.