America’s Cup Promoters Seek Public Aid

The president of the America’s Cup Organizing Committee told the San Diego Unified Port District on Tuesday that he expects $10 million in public money will be needed to fund preparations for yachting’s premier spectacle.

“This is not just a boat race,” Malin Burnham said. “This is an enterprise of public involvement, the most meaningful economic event that’s ever been held in San Diego. I’m hoping we can raise half of our budget with public money.”

Burnham’s appearance before the port commissioners was the first public acknowledgement by an America’s Cup official that private monies would fall short of funding the committee’s $20-million budget for race preparations.

“We know where we’ll get part of that money,” Burnham told the commissioners, referring to private and corporate sources. “We don’t know where we’ll get all of it. We need your help, your support, your underwriting.”

The commissioners took no action in response to Burnham’s appearance, except to suggest that he appear at their next meeting on May 29 and offer detailed, specific recommendations about how much money he needs and why.

Tom Ehman, one of Burnham’s lieutenants on the organizing committee, said last week that if any public money is needed, “It will be port money. In other words, it will be port revenue, which is quasi-public money but isn’t taxpayer money.”

However, Burnham said after Tuesday’s meeting that the organizing committee has “pockets of strong support” in collecting money from the city’s transient occupancy tax, sometimes referred to as the hotel-motel tax, or TOT.

City Councilman Bob Filner said last week that the organizing committee should turn to the entities that stand to benefit the most--hotels, restaurants and travel agencies--and leave city money untouched.

Paul Downey, spokesman for Mayor Maureen O’Connor, said last week that while the mayor backs “with enthusiasm” San Diego’s playing host to the race, she does not favor any portion of city money being used, including the so-called TOT tax.

Pointing to the city’s $60 million budget deficit, Downey said, “When it comes to hard cash, we just don’t have it.”

Don Nay, Port District director, said last week that while his agency’s revenues now exceed expenditures by more than $40 million, the port is facing a series of lawsuits that put its money in limbo.

“I’m sure people will turn to us,” Nay said of the organizing committee, “but we have many more demands than resources.”

Burnham said he hoped that TOT tax revenues could be used to provide the $10 million.

“In terms of the millions of dollars this will mean to the local economy, for the community not to be willing to put forth 1 to 2 cents (in the form of an increase in the TOT tax), well, I think that’s crazy,” Burnham said.

Burnham said that 17 international yachting syndicates have lined up sites in San Diego Bay that are owned by private boatyards and marinas. He said that 14 syndicates have paid the required $25,000 entry fee, and another 7 are expected to do so before the May 26 deadline.

Burnham pointed to a world map that indicated the countries where the 21 prospective challengers will come from: Canada, England (4 syndicates), Spain, France, Italy (2), Yugoslavia, West Germany, Denmark, Scotland, Sweden, the Soviet Union, Japan (2), Australia (2) and New Zealand (2).

Burnham said yachting’s world championship would begin in San Diego next May. He called this a “warm-up” for the America’s Cup trials, which are scheduled from January to May in 1992. The finals will be in May of that year.

He said crews and syndicates would be arriving by December and “will be here in our community 15 to 16 months on a full-time basis.” He said he expects 2 to 4 America’s Cup “defense teams” from the United States, in addition to the global challengers.

He indicated that the organizing committee’s most costly expenditures would be in setting up race headquarters and an international media center.

But the cost, he said, would be “well worth it.”

“This is one of the top three sporting competitions in the world,” said Burnham, who recently announced his intention to become one of several minority owners of the San Diego Padres baseball team. “The other two are the Olympics and the World Cup soccer competition. We’re right in a class with those.”

After the meeting, Burnham said 78th District State Assembly candidate Mike Gotch “doesn’t know what he’s talking about” in suggesting no public monies be used in funding the America’s Cup.

Gotch recently spoke out against the use of public funds in bankrolling the America’s Cup, the finals of which are scheduled for San Diego in May of 1992. Preparations and preliminary races start long before then, however, and Gotch’s comments were in response to a proposed Assembly bill--since dropped--that would have mandated $10 million in the form of an America’s Cup “start-up” loan.

“It is not the responsibility of government to underwrite the America’s Cup,” Gotch said in an interview with The Times on Tuesday. “It’s an event that ought to be funded--entirely--by corporate sponsors and the business community.