Chargers Can Set Move to New City in Motion

New stadium or bust.

That’s the unspoken credo of the San Diego Chargers, who in the coming days could begin a process that will either get them new digs in San Diego or a new city to call home -- possibly Los Angeles.

Beginning today, the Chargers have 60 days to trigger an escape clause in their Qualcomm Stadium lease, the first step toward potential relocation. The clause can be activated if certain financial conditions are met, and several sources say that will happen.

The Chargers’ relationship with the San Diego community has become increasingly strained in recent years, not only because the team has fared poorly, but because of a controversial ticket guarantee. The provision, agreed to in the afterglow of San Diego’s only Super Bowl appearance, promises the Chargers revenue equivalent to 60,000 general admission seats for every home game in the first 10 years of the lease, signed in 1995.

By the end of last season, the city had spent $25.3 million on unsold tickets since 1997, almost offsetting the $28.9 million in rent collected during that span. The San Diego Union-Tribune recently reported the city has been billed for hundreds of nonexistent seats per game, seats removed to comply with the Americans with Disabilities Act.

“It’s an amazing situation,” said George Mitrovich, president of the City Club of San Diego, a non-partisan public forum. “The hard truth is that if you look at the city’s deal with the Chargers and compare it to other cities’ deals with their NFL teams, it’s not so bad. The real bone in the throat is the ticket guarantee.”

Further complicating matters, San Diego is hosting the Super Bowl on Jan. 26, leading some people to believe the Chargers will wait until a day after the game to activate their out clause.

The Chargers have informed San Diego Mayor Dick Murphy they are willing to do away with the current lease -- ticket guarantee included -- and sign a two-year deal to stay. That would clear the way to put a new stadium and development of the Qualcomm site on the November 2004 ballot. The caveat to that deal, though, is the city can’t throw up any legal roadblocks if the Chargers want to leave after the 2004 season.

Murphy, who declined to be interviewed for this story, has said he’s waiting for a report from the 15-member Citizens’ Task Force on Chargers Issues, a group formed by the City Council in July. That report will be finished at earliest in mid-February -- after the triggering period -- and so far things have not gone smoothly. Task force members say the team is making their job harder by withholding the new stadium proposal and crucial financial documents. The Chargers say their proposal needs more fleshing out and opening their books takes time.

Either way, it’s yet another vexing turn for a community that seems more and more ambivalent about hanging onto its NFL franchise.

“About 20% of the people here really want to keep the Chargers, and another 20% would really like to see them go,” said Ron Fowler, chairman of the San Diego Super Bowl host committee. “The other 60%, the silent majority, is on the fence about the whole thing.”

As soon as the Chargers activate their escape clause, assuming they can, they are free to shop around for offers from other cities. When the clause is triggered, the clock starts ticking on a 90-day negotiating period between the Chargers and San Diego. But if plans for a new stadium are not already in the pipeline, it’s unlikely much will be accomplished during that three-month span.

The Chargers have as long as 18 months after the negotiating period to come back with an offer from another city -- although, in theory, that offer could come immediately after the triggering event -- and San Diego has 60 days to match.

“Our basic position is we need to start talking soon,” said Mark Fabiani, the Chargers’ point man on new stadium issues. “We need to get rid of the things that irritate people here -- the trigger, the ticket guarantee -- if there’s going to be a realistic chance for this city to keep the team.... By the spring, we’ll have a pretty good idea of what’s possible and what’s not possible.”

The Chargers already plan to move part of their operation to L.A. Beginning in July, they will stage training camp at the Carson sports complex being built by billionaire Philip Anschutz, a conspicuous relocation considering the team’s La Jolla-based camp has long been the envy of the league. Charger officials say the move to Carson will reduce distractions and help make the team more competitive.

The NFL badly wants to have a team in the nation’s second-largest TV market, and L.A. has been without one since the Raiders and Rams left after the 1994 season. It’s not clear where a team would play, however, considering neither the Rose Bowl nor the Coliseum is a suitable long-term solution in its current state.

At the quiet behest of league officials, consultant John Moag hooked up with Rose Bowl officials in August and now is leading the push to make that stadium NFL-ready. Moag, chairman of a Maryland sports investment-banking firm, has experience with NFL relocations. He paved the way for the Cleveland Browns to relocate to Baltimore.

That said, the Rose Bowl would need a complete renovation, which would cost in the neighborhood of $400 million. Presumably, that money would be generated from several sources, among them a $150-million loan from the NFL -- via the relocating team -- and the promise of multiple Super Bowls, which would allow for the sale of special seat licenses for those championship games.

Rose Bowl officials have retained consultant Max Muhleman and HOK, a Missouri company that designs and builds stadiums. It’s worth noting the Chargers, too, have hired Muhleman, who helped Charlotte land the Carolina Panthers and worked with groups in Baltimore, Nashville, St. Louis and Oakland, and HOK.

Many people in San Diego have questioned why the Chargers need a new stadium, especially after taxpayers spent $78 million to upgrade Qualcomm in 1997. Charger task force member Bruce Henderson, a longtime community watchdog, said the actual cost was between $150 million and $200 million if one were to factor in the cost of the ticket guarantee and extending the trolley line to the stadium.

The main reason NFL owners want new stadiums is the money-making potential of luxury suites, which generate revenues that a team doesn’t have to share with the other 31 teams in the league. Qualcomm has 113 of those suites, significantly fewer when compared to newer NFL stadiums such as Browns Stadium in Cleveland, Heinz Field in Pittsburgh and Washington’s FedEx Field.

In a presentation to the task force three months ago, NFL consultant Rick Horrow presented figures showing the Chargers’ local revenue ranked 24th of the 31 teams playing in 2001. He said the Chargers were projected to fall to 27th this year, to 28th in 2003, and to 29th in 2004 and 2005.

“The Chargers will be economically uncompetitive without a new revenue-generating facility,” Horrow told the task force.

That concept does not necessarily leave San Diegans reaching for their wallets.

“I’d like to see the Chargers stay,” said Bill Adair, vice president of a San Diego realty company that has purchased Charger season tickets since 1961. “It would be a sad commentary not to have a team here. I could see spending some more money on Qualcomm Stadium, but I can’t see building a new stadium for them.”

Although there has been no formal presentation to this effect, the Chargers envision splitting the cost of a new stadium with the city, and building the venue on the current 166-acre Qualcomm site. Fabiani said the city could use part of that land for open space, a park along a beautified river, and mixed-use development that would generate tax revenue.

Mitrovich, president of the City Club, cannot imagine civic leaders rushing to endorse any plan that taps into the general fund.

“Who is there that really wants to put their political fortunes on the line for the Chargers?” he said. “I don’t know that there’s anyone.”