Irvine Raises Stake in Luring Football to El Toro Location

The centerpiece of Irvine’s bid for a professional football team is that the stadium would be built without taxpayer money.

But as its long-shot effort enters a critical period, the city this week agreed to spend $275,000 to promote the idea of a stadium at the El Toro Marine Corps Air Station.

So far, Irvine has paid $136,102 to consultants and for staff work on the stadium plan.

Mayor Christina L. Shea said this week that the money eventually will be reimbursed if the sports investment group the city is working with can put together $500 million in private financing to build the stadium. But a reimbursement to the city isn’t guaranteed if the Los Angeles-based Professional Sports Advisory Group doesn’t hammer out an agreement.

“The money is recouped when they put the deal together. I don’t see these as overwhelming expenses,” Shea added. “We’ve been at this for almost two years now, and the NFL has been very supportive.”

The city’s expenses include $70,000 for an analysis of stadium finances and $15,000 for a survey of county residents on the team idea, as well as $15,000 paid to former USC football star Anthony Davis’ investment group.

Anaheim hasn’t spent any out-of-pocket money toward a competing plan to bring an NFL team back to the city in a proposed stadium that would be built on city-owned land adjacent to Edison International Field.

Anaheim Mayor Tom Daly said the city agreed to let a private group, spearheaded by Orange County businessman Wayne Wedin, take the lead in discussions with the league with no financial strings for the city.

However, city staffers have been involved with “number crunching” and conceptual meetings, he said.

“This is definitely privately driven,” Daly said. “We’d love to have another NFL team. But I don’t anticipate Anaheim will spend more than what little amount we’ve already spent on this.”

Both cities are pursuing plans amid discussions by NFL team owners of creating a 32nd team franchise somewhere in the country. A meeting last month of the owners, to which neither Irvine nor Anaheim was invited, zeroed in on proposals for the Los Angeles Coliseum and the cities of Carson and Houston.

Shea said the biggest roadblock in moving faster on the Irvine proposal remains the uncertain ownership of 440 acres on the southern edge of the base, where the city hopes the stadium would be built. That chunk of the base is within Irvine city limits; the city already has completed environmental studies needed to develop the property.

Orange County officials want the 440 acres as part of its overall El Toro master plan to transform the base into an international airport--and will fight to get it. The county believes a stadium is not compatible with the airport because the land is beneath the proposed approach path for aircraft.

“We’re going to request the land for safety reasons and we think we’re justified in asking for it,” Ellen Cox Call, spokeswoman for the county’s El Toro development program, said Wednesday.

Navy officials have said they won’t make any decisions about who gets the land until a so-called record of decision is signed on the base’s disposition, expected in late 1999 or early 2000.

Davis, a leader of the investment group working with Irvine, said he remains optimistic that a stadium can be built, even if the base is turned into an airport. He said his group has lined up $500 million from private investors to build the stadium if a team franchise is granted to Irvine.

“Some people feel that [an airport] would be an asset to the stadium,” he said. “I’m very optimistic.”

Councilman Dave Christensen said Wednesday that the city is committed to the idea of a football stadium. And extending the agreement with Davis’ group doesn’t preclude another group from becoming involved if a football deal doesn’t materialize in the next year or two, he said.

“There are other possibilities,” he said. “They have exclusivity on this for a short period of time.”

Christensen said he couldn’t discuss the options because of the passage Tuesday night of a secrecy ordinance that makes it a misdemeanor punishable by six months in jail or a $1,000 fine for revealing information obtained during a closed session of the City Council.

Closed sessions are allowed as exemptions under the state’s open meeting law but there are no penalties if information from the meeting later is discussed publicly. Closed sessions can be held when topics are litigation and personnel matters.

Christensen and Shea voted against the ordinance, scheduled to take effect Dec. 24, while council members Mike Ward, Greg Smith and Barry Hammond voted for it.