Pratt Says NFL Shows Interest in City’s Plan : Super Bowl: Councilman visits football commissioner to discuss minorities’ role if the 1993 game is played in S.D.

Saying National Football League officials were “most intrigued” by San Diego’s proposal for an “equal-opportunity” Super Bowl in 1993, City Councilman Wes Pratt reported that Thursday’s meeting in New York with Commissioner Paul Tagliabue went “extraordinarily well.”

Pratt, the city’s only black council member, attended the meeting at the invitation of the San Diego Super Bowl Task Force, of which he is not a member. He was asked to go, he said, because of the controversy surrounding a local tribute to Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.

Asked about the league’s concerns surrounding the King issue in San Diego, Pratt laughed and said, “It never came up--wasn’t mentioned a single time.”

Because Arizona voters rejected a state holiday in honor of King last November, Tagliabue hopes to remove the game from Phoenix in 1993.

The NFL has said that only San Diego and Pasadena are being considered as replacement sites. But, in 1987, San Diego voters changed the name of Martin Luther King Boulevard back to its original Market Street, evoking a storm of local protest.

The protest widened in 1989, after the San Diego Unified Port District rejected a San Diego City Council suggestion to name the new bayfront convention center in honor of King. On Tuesday, the council will consider a request to name Marina Linear Park after King.

Pratt said protest groups are “entitled to their opinion” in criticizing his decision to go to New York. Greg Akili, the head of the African-American Organizing Project, which has demonstrated against the game coming to San Diego, called Pratt’s involvement “naked tokenism.”

“Some people may perceive that I took a risk by coming here,” Pratt said Thursday from New York. “But I felt it was worth it. I think we have a great chance for getting the game, and I’m even more encouraged after meeting with the commissioner.

“I’m trying to promote the city of San Diego. I see a $150-million minority business opportunity in the game coming here. But (the protesters) can have their opinion. That’s what America’s all about.”

Pratt attended Thursday’s meeting with businessmen Leon Parma and Bob Payne, the chairman of the San Diego Super Bowl Task Force, as well as newspaper executive Herb Klein, Assistant City Manager Jack McGrory and Dal Watkins from the Convention & Visitors Bureau.

Pratt said he had been assured that the January, 1993, event--if awarded to San Diego--would be a showcase for small and minority-owned businesses. He said NFL officials saw this gesture as the most compelling aspect of the San Diego presentation.

“It was a positive meeting, an upbeat meeting,” Pratt said. “Equal opportunity was their major concern. It’s always hard to tell exactly where you stand, but I had a great feeling about the meeting. I think our chances are very good.”

Pratt said the group met with Norman Braman, owner of the Philadelphia Eagles; Mike Brown, owner of the Cincinnati Bengals, and Jim Steeg, the NFL’s director of special events, who lauded the city’s efforts during Super Bowl XXII in 1988.

He said the group met later with Commissioner Tagliabue. NFL spokesman Greg Aiello said that Pasadena and San Diego are considered even at this point and that the site will be named at a meeting of league owners in Kona, Hawaii, on March 19.

A delegation from Los Angeles also met with Tagliabue on Thursday. But, in an interview last week, David Simon, the chairman of the Los Angeles Sports Council, which hopes to lure the game to Pasadena’s Rose Bowl, said an equal-opportunity gesture comparable to San Diego’s “hasn’t come up. It hasn’t even been talked about.”

Simon said his city has the backing of Los Angeles Mayor Tom Bradley; a larger stadium in the Rose Bowl (101,000 seats, contrasted with 73,300 in San Diego Jack Murphy Stadium); the record of having finished second to San Diego’s third in the first competition for Super Bowl XXVII and “no semblance of a controversy” involving the King issue.

Pratt predicted that Tuesday’s vote on whether to name Marina Linear Park after King will have “no effect.”

“I think it’s going to be a positive vote (by the council),” Pratt said. “I think the city will name the park after Dr. King, but assuming it’s a negative vote, I don’t see it having an impact. Again, (the NFL’s) major concern is this equal-opportunity approach, and we’re prepared to show them we can do it.

“That’s what’s going to sell when it comes to San Diego getting this game.”