Anaheim Might Not Be a Sports Town

Walt Disney Co.’s decision to abandon plans to purchase the California Angels has left civic and sports leaders at odds over the future of professional sports in Orange County, while the baseball team’s owner took angry aim at the city of Anaheim.

Many civic and sports leaders said Thursday they are prepared to begin focusing on efforts to bring professional football back to the county. Anaheim officials reaffirmed their commitment to keeping the Angels in town past the team’s current lease, which expires in 2001, but Angel owner Jackie Autry said Thursday night she would consider moving the team at that time.

After weeks of around-the-clock negotiations with the city, Disney announced Wednesday that it had dropped plans to buy controlling interest in the Angels because of an impasse with the city over sharing the cost of stadium renovations and other issues. The decision, just four days before a Disney-imposed deadline to reach an agreement, now has owners Gene and Jackie Autry searching for another buyer.

Jackie Autry said she believes the collapse boiled down to one major issue: football.

“I’ve come to realize that Anaheim wants football more than baseball,” Autry said. “This has to do with the fact that the city wants football to be played in the current stadium. They realized they couldn’t get [a team] to play there if Disney began renovations.”

She lamented the city’s plans for Sportstown Anaheim, a multimillion-dollar sports, retail and entertainment complex that would surround Anaheim Stadium and link it to the Pond nearby.

There are no known investors for the project, which the city hopes to use to attract a football team to replace the Rams, who left for St. Louis last year. The Seattle Seahawks are supposed to begin practice Monday at Rams Park, and with the team’s owner anxious to move to Southern California, city officials hope to lure the team to Anaheim permanently.

Sportstown and the city’s hopes for a new professional football team were said to be two of the biggest issues that Disney and the city could not reconcile.

Jackie Autry said Disney officials told her the city wanted the company to commit to a 33-year lease for the Angels, while the entertainment giant wanted a 15-year lease.

She said other sticking points were the city’s insistence on reserving the right to impose an admission tax on tickets at the Big A and on revenues from events at a second stadium, if it were to be built.

Infuriated at the city, Autry said she will consider moving the team when its lease expires in 2001 and that Hollywood Park Chairman and Chief Operating Officer R.D. Hubbard has expressed interest in building the team a baseball-only stadium in Inglewood.

City officials could not be reached late Thursday to respond to Autry’s comments but several had said earlier that baseball and the Angels remain their top priority.

“The Angels have played in Anaheim for 30 years, they are the major tenant at Anaheim Stadium and they are the priority,” Mayor Tom Daly said.

Said Councilman Frank Feldhaus: “I feel bad for Gene and Jackie Autry because I know they were counting on this deal going through. I’m confident that something can be worked out with another purchaser of the ballclub or with Disney itself.”

Jackie Autry said she envisions several problems arising from the construction of Sportstown, including parking and concession revenues, particularly if a football team is added to the mix.

“We’ll make sure that the next [Angels] owner complies with the lease until 2001 and that the city complies with a 1994 legal judgment which says they can’t touch any element of our parking lot without our consent, which means the soonest they can touch our facility is 2003.”

Referring to the uncertainty of landing a football team, Autry said the city “doesn’t realize that their primary anchor for Sportstown has to be a baseball club; I think they are living in a vacuum.”

“There’s blame to be laid at both parties’ feet,” she said. “It’s going to take some third party to try and get them back together into the room.”

American League President Gene Budig spoke with both Walt Disney Co. and Anaheim officials Thursday morning in an attempt to revive the negotiations.

“We’ve encouraged continued dialogue and we will continue to do so,” Budig said. “The [Angels] are a valued member of the American League and we believe Disney would be especially good for its future. We also believe that Disney has much to offer major league baseball.”

But both city and Disney officials said Thursday that nothing has changed.

“We have no official meetings planned,” said Disney Sports Enterprises spokesman Bill Robertson. “The ball is in the city of Anaheim’s court.”

City spokesman Bret Colson said, “at this point, we consider the negotiations to be ended and we’ve received no word to the contrary.”