City Keeps Options Open in Bid for Team : Sports: Council refuses to ban use of tax dollars to lure NFL to the Coliseum but bars tapping general fund or new revenue.

The Los Angeles City Council kept open the possibility Tuesday that public funds could be used to bring professional football back to the Coliseum, but barred the use of money from the city’s general fund or new tax revenue.

A majority of council members, however, backed away from a proposal to completely ban the use of city taxpayers’ dollars for the effort. Instead, the council left intact the possibility that the massive parking structures demanded by the National Football League at Exposition Park could be constructed with so-called tax increment financing.

While doing little to advance the cause of securing a franchise for the Coliseum, the vote does further--or at least, does not undercut--the citywide political ambitions of council members Laura Chick, who wants to be controller; Joel Wachs, who wants to be mayor, and Mark Ridley-Thomas, who wants to expand his influence.

Their debate provided perhaps the first glimpses of the campaign speeches voters soon could be hearing. Chick, who authored the proposal to ban public funds, said the city should use its money to replace a problematic payroll system and to collect money from debtors--both issues of significance to the controller’s office. Wachs said he will explore an initiative effort to allow voters citywide to decide whether any public funds should be offered to the NFL, the sort of thing around which mayoral campaigns are built.

And Ridley-Thomas, who began as the lone crusader to return football to the Coliseum, barely mentioned the sport as he contended that the issue is more about creating parking and other improvements in the Exposition Park area, home to several city museums, including the popular California Science Center. He said the city should provide equal treatment to that part of the city as it would--and has--to other sections of Los Angeles.

“I think the Hoover Redevelopment Project [in which the Coliseum is located] should be given the same opportunities. . . . What you do in Hollywood, what you do downtown, you should do in Exposition Park,” Ridley-Thomas said. “It’s a mistake to reduce this to football. This is a significant aspect of revitalization.”

Prospective team owner Eli Broad, a billionaire businessman heavily involved in efforts to revitalize downtown, has urged council members not to reject all public money for football, but rather to support negotiating a deal with the understanding that it would not raise taxes, divert existing taxes or pose any risk to taxpayers. The council action Tuesday is in line with that recommendation, which comes from a man with a history of heavy political giving.

But while one parking financing option remains alive, it is unclear whether anything at this point can rescue Los Angeles’ chances of securing a team, at least in this round.

Speaking on a radio show Tuesday, Mayor Richard Riordan said, “The vibes out of there [the league] are not very good right now.”

NFL owners rejected a proposal that would have had the state arrange to build 15,000 parking spaces at Exposition Park in return for keeping the parking revenue from those spaces. The estimated tab for that project is about $150 million, but NFL Commissioner Paul Tagliabue said more public money was needed for the NFL to come to Los Angeles.

Talks among the city, state and league then essentially broke off. Since then, local supporters of the effort have tried to renew interest in it and to develop a financing plan that would satisfy the NFL without alienating local voters.

The tax increment proposal is their latest attempt at that, but the council’s willingness to consider it is a far cry from it coming true.

For one thing, the state would be asked to give up the biggest chunk of the new tax money, and has not agreed to such a proposal. Bill Chadwick, Gov. Gray Davis’ point man on the football campaign, advised against such a financing method.

Davis has not addressed it publicly, but privately has told some associates he is skeptical of the suggestion that the state give up its share of the income taxes generated by the team and its players in return for bringing a team to the Coliseum.

Time, meanwhile, is fast running out. The NFL’s expansion committee meets Thursday in Washington, and league officials will discuss the issue again next week in New York.

League sentiment seems to favor awarding a team to Houston.