Los Angeles Football Stadium Proposals [Archive] - Page 5

Westsidelife

January 19th, 2011, 07:48 AM

AEG Chief Joins Run at NFL Team

Philip Anschutz lists conditions for downtown stadium.

By Howard Fine
January 17, 2011

Billionaire Philip Anschutz is now on board with his namesake company’s plan to build a football stadium in downtown Los Angeles – he just wants some conditions met before he plunks down the cash.

That’s according to Anschutz’s top deputy in Los Angeles, Tim Leiweke, president of Anschutz Entertainment Group. In an interview with the Business Journal last week about AEG’s $1 billion stadium proposal, Leiweke said Anschutz, who made his fortune in oil and telecommunications, has been involved in many of the key decisions about the plan, including selection of the three stadium design finalists.

“He’s very enthusiastic about the project,” Leiweke said, adding that the Denver tycoon has discussed the matter with some of his friends who own National Football League teams.

But given his frustrations over previous plans he’s worked on to bring a football team to Los Angeles, Leiweke said his boss won’t sign any checks until four conditions are met:

• Agreements with various corporations for naming rights and other sponsorships that would bring in tens of millions of dollars in annual revenue.

• A commitment from Los Angeles city officials for speedy approvals and $350 million in bonds to replace the West Hall of the city-owned Los Angeles Convention Center that would be torn down to make way for the stadium.

• A commitment from an NFL team to move to Los Angeles.

• A commitment from the NFL itself to approve an L.A. team.

Leiweke said that AEG is trying to meet three of these four conditions by a self-imposed March deadline; the agreement from the league would likely have to wait for the owners to conclude negotiations with players over a new contract.

The corporate sponsorships are perhaps the most crucial element for Anschutz, since they represent the revenue stream that would pay back his huge up-front financial commitment.

Earlier this month, reports surfaced that AEG was close to terms with Farmers Insurance Group for stadium naming rights. Financial terms were not disclosed, though sources told the Los Angeles Times that AEG was seeking a 30-year deal starting at $20 million a year.

Leiweke did not confirm or deny those reports. He would only say that a deal for naming rights and several deals for “founding partner” sponsorships would be announced in the coming weeks.

The AEG proposal is in competition with Majestic Realty Co., which has been trying to bring a football team to a stadium it wants to build in City of Industry.

AEG owns stadiums and sports teams around the world, including the Staples Center, part of the Los Angeles Kings hockey team, Galaxy soccer team and part of the Los Angeles Lakers. Majestic Chief Executive Ed Roski also owns part of the Kings and part of the Lakers.

Marc Ganis, president of Sportscorp Ltd., a Chicago-based sports consulting company, said that getting a commitment for naming rights and sponsorship deals would bolster AEG’s position as it prepares to enter talks with NFL team owners about moving a team to Los Angeles.

“Corporate sponsorships and naming rights are reasonable to get before the facility itself has all the approvals. Those are the kinds of agreements that businesses can make up front,” Ganis said. “Furthermore, these agreements can strengthen AEG’s position in dealings with the NFL.”

Leiweke said he was confident that a preliminary agreement could be reached with the city by March. However, several City Council members have called for studies of AEG’s proposal and its impact on the Convention Center before they will vote to support the company’s plan.

Councilwoman Jan Perry, whose district includes the Convention Center and AEG’s adjacent L.A. Live complex in downtown, said she is open to the plan, but wants to see more details about the company’s proposal before committing her support.

“We want to see some assurances that the taxpayers and the city’s general fund are protected,” she said. “Also, we want to see some figures on how much revenue would be generated over and above what the site is now generating.”

Perry has convened a working group that will start analyzing the plan next month. After that, city officials will use the analysis as a basis for a meeting with AEG. Although she wouldn’t rule out meeting the mid-March deadline, the timetable she laid out would make it difficult to do so.

$1 billion cost?

Leiweke’s comments are significant because Anschutz’s support of the project has been characterized as cool or lukewarm in recent published reports, although the press-shy Anschutz was not quoted himself in any of those reports.

Discussing the matter with the Business Journal last week, Leiweke clarified Anschutz’s involvement and also addressed varying cost estimates of AEG’s stadium project.

Building the stadium itself on the site of the current West Hall of the Convention Center would cost about $1 billion, including a retractable roof that would allow the stadium to serve as convention floor and meeting space. Leiweke said an estimated $150 million “buy-in” for a football team and $350 million in bonds to pay for a replacement building at the Convention Center would bring the total cost to $1.5 billion.

Even if the costs rise beyond that, Leiweke said that the project will be entirely financed by AEG in order to avoid controversy.

“The important thing here is that this is our money, so it shouldn’t matter to anyone else whether it’s $1 billion, $1.2 billion or $1.5 billion. We’re going to pay for the stadium – whatever it costs. Period.”

Leiweke said Majestic’s $800 million proposal still lacks a team despite Roski’s long efforts, and that the NFL owners don’t seem to want a team in the City of Industry.

“I like Ed Roski and respect him, but they’ve been working on this project for a long time and they don’t have a team,” he said. “The reason is simple: Team owners and the NFL don’t believe that the City of Industry is the right location for a football team.”

Majestic Vice President John Semcken would not comment directly on Leiweke’s statement.

NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell has said that the NFL owners won’t get around to deciding whether to bring a football team to Los Angeles until a new collective bargaining agreement with players is in place. The current agreement expires March 4 and Ganis said he expects the negotiations to drag on at least through the spring.

“There is no way a decision about putting a team in L.A. will be made before the collective bargaining agreement is reached,” Ganis said. “Any talk about convincing a team to move to Los Angeles before that is pure fantasy.”

Leiweke said that Anschutz could wait beyond the March deadline for an NFL decision.

No public funds?

The L.A. region has been without an NFL team since the Rams left Anaheim in 1995 for St. Louis; the Raiders left the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum the previous year and returned to Oakland.

In 1999, Roski and Anschutz took part in a proposal to renovate the Coliseum in Exposition Park as a home for an NFL expansion team. The league picked Houston instead when that city agreed to $200 million in public subsidies. Los Angeles officials had rejected any public funding for Coliseum renovation.

Although several writers and observers have opined that taxpayer money must be involved at least in a fairly substantial way in AEG’s plan, Leiweke last week repeated that no public money would be used to fund the stadium.

He said the $350 million would pay for a new hall at the city-owned Convention Center to replace the West Hall, which would have to be torn down to make way for the stadium. The bonds would be paid off with a surcharge on tickets sold for events at the football stadium; any shortfall in the bond payments would be covered by AEG.

“This keeps getting labeled as public financing for the stadium, but nothing could be further from the truth,” Leiweke said. “If we weren’t stepping in with this proposal, the West Hall would have had to be replaced eventually anyway, and that would have been with taxpayer funds. This way, the city gets a new convention hall and taxpayers don’t pay a dime for it.”

As Majestic was planning its stadium, City of Industry approved $500 million in bonds for infrastructure improvements in the city, some of which will be spent on streets and other construction for the stadium. The bonds would be paid for with revenue from ticket and parking surcharges.

Semcken said that Majestic’s proposal is superior.

“The Majestic proposal is the preferred site and best suited for the NFL and Southern California,” Semcken said in an e-mail.

Leiweke said his biggest concern is the possible emergence of opponents who could delay or derail the project.

“The only thing that keeps me up at night is someone throwing grenades at the project for their own personal agenda,” he said.

If the project were to get sidetracked – or if Majestic manages to secure a football team first – Leiweke said he has plenty of other projects at AEG to keep him busy.

“I’m off to Beijing tomorrow for a stadium project we have there that we just secured naming rights on,” he said.

http://www.labusinessjournal.com/news/2011/jan/17/aeg-chief-joins-run-nfl-team/

saiholmes

January 20th, 2011, 05:25 AM

Edit

Westsidelife

January 20th, 2011, 10:02 AM

... Leiweke said today it's his belief that the National Football League will bring a team to LA, so AEG doesn't need a commitment in place before going forward with plans for a stadium. "We are prepared to move forward without the promise of a team,” Leiweke told the subcommittee. ...

http://la.curbed.com/archives/2011/01/game_analysis_gossip_from_todays_aegs_nfl_pitch.php#more

Westsidelife

January 20th, 2011, 10:17 AM

The more I look at it, the more I prefer the HKS proposal:

http://farm6.static.flickr.com/5283/5356369225_0bb77d4eae_b.jpg

slipperydog

January 20th, 2011, 02:11 PM

Looks like Roski may be turning attention to Vegas

UNLV is in early discussions to build a football stadium on campus and renovate the Thomas & Mack Center, school officials confirmed Wednesday.

President Neal Smatresk said in a statement that the school and entrepreneurs Ed Roski and Craig Cavileer are exploring a "public-private partnership" to build a multipurpose sports and entertainment complex on campus and to renovate UNLV's basketball arena. Caliveer is the president of the Silverton Casino Hotel and Lodge, which Roski owns.

http://www.lasvegassun.com/news/2011/jan/19/unlv-acknowledges-effort-bring-stadium-football-ma/

University president Neal Smatresk said in a statement Wednesday he has been in talks with Ed Roski and Craig Cavileer to form "a public-private partnership."

Roski owns Los Angeles-based Majestic Realty, one of the world's largest commercial builders. He also helped build L.A.'s Staples Center, and he has a stake in both the NBA's Lakers and NHL's Kings.

Cavileer, president of the Silverton Casino and a longtime business associate of Roski, said the development will be "much more" than just a stadium.

He would not discuss details but said he and Roski may make a formal announcement by week's end.

http://www.lvrj.com/sports/unlv-in-talks-to-build-stadium-and-entertainment-complex-114235759.html

Kenny

January 21st, 2011, 06:10 AM

lol good.

milquetoast

January 22nd, 2011, 12:08 PM

milquetoast

January 22nd, 2011, 12:10 PM

milquetoast

January 22nd, 2011, 12:11 PM

croyboy

January 22nd, 2011, 08:11 PM

wow. idiots. completely backwards. have those guys ever been downtown?

i don't think you can classify tipping a van over a riot. besides that, the police handled the situation well. any other stadium anywhere else would have been just as roudy if they had won a home game championship. it doesn't happen at any other home game all year long (and we don't win championships every year either).

the convention center doesn't make as much revenue as we would like to believe, so it's actually good to build that area to be of use to us all year around. revenue would actually be excedingly higher.

and i remember how shady the place USED to be. ever since staples, the area has become unimaginably better in safety/walkability. even the construction of the convention center itself didn't make the area immediately better.

and that area has a ton of parking. we actually could get rid of the flat lots and use structures. plus blue line access is just too easy.

a stadium built anywhere else would be a bad idea since this option is a reality.

milquetoast

January 23rd, 2011, 10:07 AM

and that area has a ton of parking. we actually could get rid of the flat lots and use structures. plus blue line access is just too easy.

Come on, you heard the guys! People were killed- and I'm sure the cops were extremely dehydrated at some point! Plus, that West Hall is something else!

croyboy

January 23rd, 2011, 08:22 PM

haha!! there were no deaths, our cops have seen some s*** so that was a pretty relaxing gig for them, and west hall is never in use (it is, but how many days out of the year)

saiholmes

January 24th, 2011, 04:07 AM

Is this commercial sponsored by Ed Roski?

saiholmes

January 24th, 2011, 04:14 AM

Project Overview
Developer: AEG.
Project Manager: ICON Venue Group, LLC.
Design Firm: Expected to be announced January 2011.
Location: Current West Hall of the Los Angeles Convention Center.
Details:

Construction of a new West Hall would be completed before demolition of current West Hall begins so convention bookings would not be interrupted. South Hall would increase by 90,000 sq. ft. The total new Event Center would be 1,400,000 gross sq. ft. The upgraded convention center with increased continuous flat, unobstructed exhibition space would propel Los Angeles to #5 in U.S. convention centers compared to #15 now.

The new Event Center would enable Los Angeles to attract a multitude of high profile events including the Super Bowl, Pro Bowl, NCAA Championships, Olympic events and National Conventions. 72,000- 76,250 seating capacity. Able to host four teams simultaneously. 32,000 parking spaces currently within a 15 minute walk with additional upgrades to current structures. $1 billion total investment, all privately funded. Changes the face of downtown and creates 18,000 temporary and permanent living wage and union jobs. Multiplier effect anticipated to lead to five new hotel developments near Los Angeles Convention Center with an additional 3,000 room keys.

Allows Los Angeles to compete for many of the industries top 50 conventions that the Los Angeles Convention Center is currently too small to host. Only six other cities have both a convention center AND adjacent stadium tandem. No other city would have a stadium located closer to its convention center. Stadium accessible location with access to Blue Line, Red Line- 3 Metro lines with 5 stops within walking distance. Target date for occupancy is Fall 2015.

Read more: http://www.thelaeventcenter.com/ProjectOverview.htm

saiholmes

January 24th, 2011, 04:17 AM

L.A. city leaders support idea of new downtown NFL stadium
AEG President Tim Leiweke presents plans at a City Council committee meeting, and chairwoman of panel pushes for immediate study of financing, transportation and environmental issues.
By Lance Pugmire
8:32 PM PST, January 19, 2011

At the first City Council committee meeting to consider AEG's proposal for a new downtown NFL stadium Wednesday, city leaders embraced the idea and moved to fast-track the project.

"We want all hands on deck," said Councilwoman Janice Hahn, chairwoman of the Trade, Commerce and Tourism Committee, which listened to AEG President Tim Leiweke's presentation of his company's plan for a privately financed $1 billion football stadium attached to a renovated Los Angeles Convention Center. "The case to bring a team here is a great case."

Hahn recommended a working group headed by the city's chief legislative analyst Gerry Miller to immediately begin studying financing, transportation and environmental issues connected to the project, while also pushing for an independent financial analysis. Hahn will make those requests official in motions at Friday's full City Council meeting.

"The trust of the public is most important as we move forward," Hahn said during the committee meeting at City Hall. "People are losing their jobs, they're out of work. We want it to be a transparent process, with accountability."

Leiweke came promising a solution to the dire economic times, touting, "We are beginning a process officially today to bring forth a vision that will bring the NFL back to Los Angeles … a catalyst to the largest downtown development in Los Angeles, with 20,000 to 30,000 jobs created."

Spurred by conversations with NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell and league owners seeking a new stadium, Leiweke said AEG's billionaire Chairman Philip Anschutz is behind the pursuit of bringing the NFL back to Los Angeles for the first time since 1995, when the Rams and Raiders exited.

The planned retractable roof stadium would seat 64,000, with the ability to expand to 78,000 for a Super Bowl or Final Four. The Times has reported AEG is in talks with Farmers Insurance for a lucrative naming-rights deal. Leiweke also noted the Coliseum "is out of the NFL business."

Leiweke declined to say which NFL owners he regularly converses with and opted to avoid criticizing a rival NFL stadium project in the City of Industry. The San Diego Chargers, Minnesota Vikings, Jacksonville Jaguars and St. Louis Rams are thought to be possible tenants.

"We'll be bringing a team to L.A.," Leiweke said to committee members Hahn and Councilman Tom LaBonge. The NFL "encouraged us to jump in, they believe this is the best location.… There are one or two teams ready to move. Mr. Anschutz believes a team will come if we build it. At least one team will come. We wouldn't be acting if we weren't encouraged by those men."

The stadium project has not been officially submitted to the City Council, and local and state environmental impact reports could take up to a year to be completed, a city official said. If AEG were to get an environmental exemption, it still would have to complete an environmental impact report. The exemption would protect AEG from subsequent lawsuits challenging the EIR.

The project will require city approval of $350 million in bonds to demolish the Los Angeles Convention Center's West Hall and build a new hall connecting the existing South Hall to the stadium.

That would create a proposed 1.4 million square feet of exhibition space that would boost business at a slumping facility that one city official said ranked 15th in size among convention centers in the U.S. Also the current 2,600-space parking lot would be increased to 4,000.

Leiweke said the $350-million bond would be paid back with stadium ticket taxes — "like we already do at [AEG-owned] Staples Center," he said — and that AEG promised to make up any shortfall.

"There's zero risk to the general fund, no public dollars involved," Leiweke said. "It's that simple.… We are aware of the budget issues. It's a true no-risk."

John Semcken, vice president of Majestic Realty, which is overseeing the Industry project, argued in a statement released later Wednesday that the public would bear financial responsibility for the AEG NFL stadium project to proceed, with bonds still owed by the convention center.

"Saddling the city and the taxpayers … should be a non-starter for the City Council," Semcken said in the statement.

Convention Center officials said there is still $48 million in bonds owed, but Leiweke said the debt could be added to the $350-million bond and could also be paid back with the stadium ticket taxes.

Leiweke also downplayed L.A. traffic concerns, saying that AEG traffic studies found "you could've landed a helicopter on the freeway" on Sunday late mornings when NFL traffic would typically creep downtown to the Interstate 101/10 interchange. Leiweke said AEG also would fund rail upgrades to assist with stadium/convention center access.

Hahn said she was enthused by the "exciting, aggressive proposal" and embraced the idea of moving expeditiously, although Leiweke said AEG has not imposed a strict deadline as previously reported. He said the company "knows it's a process."

AEG spokesman Michael Roth added, "We're making progress, we're meeting expectations at this point."

There won't be a public discussion about any team moving to Los Angeles before the league resolves its expiring collective-bargaining deal with players. The current agreement expires March 1.

"This is not just about eight games and a Super Bowl," but for L.A. to be able to compete for conventions, Hahn said at the meeting. "The convention center piece is the key. … More hotel rooms, more tourism increase the general fund. Those discussions — how are we going to get there? — should begin now."

Read More: http://www.latimes.com/news/science/environment/la-sp-la-nfl-stadium-20110120,0,7459705.story

vahebaronian

January 28th, 2011, 07:22 PM

Always on the site, however I have not posted in a while, but I thought people might be interested in this article:

Formal update on downtown L.A. stadium coming Tuesday
Posted by Mike Florio on January 27, 2011, 10:44 PM EST
Though Dallas will become the center of the NFL universe next week, a fairly large black hole persists in Los Angeles.

On Tuesday, those hoping to bring the NFL to a to-be-built stadium in downtown Los Angeles will conduct a press conference that promises to provide a “complete briefing,” which will include “new milestone announcements and current timeline.”

Attending will be AEG’s Tim Leiweke, Casey Wasserman, Los Angeles mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, and others.

Once the league’s labor situation is resolved, filling the void in Los Angeles becomes the next agenda item, and a sense quickly is developing that the NFL will be back in L.A. before too long.

The one major question not yet addressed is the identity of the team that will play in L.A. Leiweke recently said that “one or two teams” are ready to move.

For now, the leading candidate remains the San Diego Chargers, a franchise that geographically is the closest to Los Angeles, and that played there in its inaugural season.

http://profootballtalk.nbcsports.com/2011/01/27/formal-update-on-downtown-l-a-stadium-coming-tuesday/

milquetoast

January 29th, 2011, 02:35 PM

Vahebaronian, right now you are the King of downtown L. A. football stadium discussions.

pesto

January 29th, 2011, 07:50 PM

If we get the Chargers, at least that will bring Rivers to the Farm.

saiholmes

January 31st, 2011, 03:24 AM

Two NFL visions of the same dream
Competing proposals pit familiar adversaries hoping to lure an NFL team to L.A.
Markazi By Arash Markazi
ESPNLosAngeles.com

John Semcken has given this presentation so many times over the past two years the exact number escapes him. He's sitting in the Inverness Room on the second floor of the Pacific Palms Resort, a hotel and conference center complete with a four-star golf course in the City of Industry. A sign reading "NFL Presentation Room" is virtually permanently affixed outside the double doors of the windowless suite, which feature 16 colorful artist renderings and three detailed models of the NFL stadium Semcken and billionaire developer Ed Roski are trying to build down the road.

Semcken, a vice president in Roski's Majestic Realty Company, claims he has an answer for everything. He has been working with Roski to bring the NFL back to Los Angeles for the past 15 years and is prepared for any question the NFL may have.

Toward the end of his 45-minute PowerPoint presentation that feature more charts, graphs and polls than a political campaign, he is asked if he really thinks the NFL will return to a place called the "City of Industry," a location which is almost entirely industrial with a population of less than 1,000 people and over 2,500 businesses.

Semcken smiles and looks at Taylor Talt, a backup quarterback at USC in 2000 who is the stadium's project manager. "Should I tell him?" he asks Talt. "OK, I'll tell you."

"We're not going to call it the City of Industry, we're going to call it something else," Semcken said. "How about Grand Crossing, Calif. ... Diamond Hills, Calif. ... We don't know what we're going to call it yet but the city says they have no problem so it won't be called City of Industry."

The name has been somewhat of a mental roadblock when the group makes presentations to East Coast NFL types who might picture smokestacks and decrepit brick buildings when they hear a city called "Industry." It certainly wouldn't be the first time a name was invented for the land a stadium rests on. Jack Kent Cooke renamed the area around Jack Kent Cooke Stadium (now FedEx Field), Raljon, Md., by combining the names of his sons, Ralph and John, even though it remains part of Landover, a Maryland suburb of Washington, D.C.

That Semcken and Roski are passing the time these days thinking up new city names shows how far the group is with their project. Semcken points to the blueprints for the stadium sitting on a table in the center of the room.

"We are literally shovel-ready," Semcken said in an interview earlier this month. "There are the plans. Take a look. You want to see where the bathrooms go, or where you're going to plug in your computer or watch TV or whatever? It's all right there. We are ready to go. We could start grading the site and prepare it for the stadium the day after we got a team."

Ah, yes, a team.

About 20 miles west in downtown Los Angeles, Tim Leiweke looks out the window of his corner office overlooking L.A. Live. The Staples Center, Nokia Theatre and the 54-story JW Marriott and Ritz Carlton towers surrounding him have gone from visions to realities over the past 12 years under his watch as the president and CEO of the Anschutz Entertainment Group. (ESPNLA operates out of offices at L.A. Live.) He now wants to make another vision become a reality by tearing down the aging, disconnected west hall of the Los Angeles Convention Center to make way for a 64,000-seat retractable-roof stadium and events center (expandable to 78,000 for Super Bowls and Final Fours).

"The heart of our community has always been downtown L.A.," Leiweke said. "When you look at the Dodgers, Lakers, Kings, Clippers, USC basketball and football, they all play downtown. The Grammys, NBA and NHL All-Star Games, the Pac-10 tournament, major conventions; they all emanate from downtown Los Angeles. This is where the NFL and future events, like the Super Bowl and the Final Four, belong."

The idea to build a retractable-roof stadium -- which would be connected to the Los Angeles Convention Center and not only serve as the home of an NFL team or teams, but also major conventions, Final Fours and Super Bowls -- was first hatched by Casey Wasserman, the owner of the now defunct Los Angeles Avengers of the Arena Football League and the grandson of legendary movie mogul Lew Wasserman.

Wasserman came up with the idea while driving around the West Hall about two years ago before a meeting with Leiweke. It seemed like the perfect solution in the perfect location to solve Los Angeles' age-old problem of financing an open-air football stadium that would be contractually obligated to host only 10 NFL games a year. If they could put a retractable roof on it and make it an events center, maybe Los Angeles could finally make the finances work and the city would be more supportive of a venue that hosts more than just football games.

"The fundamental value of a market [to NFL owners] is not based on its media size, it's based on the net value derived from the stadium," Wasserman said. "L.A. is unique in that it is a large media market where there's relatively less value from a stadium than in other places, given that L.A. is not dependent on having a team and California is not a state that has traditionally publically funded private enterprise. That's why two teams left and that's why there's not a team in L.A. Until you can figure out a way to privately finance a private enterprise that's compelling enough to attract an NFL team you're not going to have a team back here."

So how does Los Angeles attract a team back? And which stadium proposal has the best chance to do that?

FINANCING

If you had to answer the question of why Los Angeles has been without an NFL team since 1995 with one word, it would be easy: financing. With no available public money and no NFL teams for sale, Los Angeles has had to find a way to privately finance a stadium that would generate enough money to make an NFL team happy while also being worthwhile to developers who may or may not have a stake in the team.

"The biggest hurdle has always been the financing of the stadium," said Eric Grubman, executive vice president of the NFL. "That has been a tough task, which has probably gotten tougher over the last five years. The reason it's gotten tougher is stadiums have gotten more expensive and because the willingness of the [player's] union to contribute [to the league's stadium-funding program] in a meaningful way has really declined over the years."

The rising cost of building stadiums also comes at a time when the NFL's G3 stadium fund dried up after the construction of the New Meadowlands Stadium and Cowboys Stadium. G3 loans were limited to $150 million per club, depending on their market and stadium cost, but the Meadowlands project received $300 million because the Giants and Jets share the stadium in a top-five television market. Los Angeles could conceivably be in line for a similar loan if the league's stadium-building subsidy program is revived. It is one of several hot-button topics that will be discussed between the league and the player's union this offseason as they try to hammer out a new collective bargaining agreement.

“We're giving the tailgate experience steroids. We're going to do things nobody has ever thought of.” -- John Semcken, vice president of Majestic Realty Company

When Houston opened the league's first retractable roof stadium in 2002 it cost $350 million. The cost of building such a facility today has skyrocketed. University of Phoenix Stadium cost $455 million when it opened in 2006, Lucas Oil Stadium cost $750 million when it opened in 2008 and Dallas Cowboys Stadium cost $1.3 billion when opened in 2009. This is one of the many reasons why critics of the downtown stadium plan believe the cost of the retractable-roof stadium, slated to open in 2015, will far exceed the current $1 billion projection.

The prospect of having a team in a new stadium in Los Angeles depends on how well both groups are able to finance their plans. Leiweke said it's what keeps him up at night these days. Semcken and Roski seem to be less worried about completing the process now, understanding the full financing can't possibly be worked out until there's an agreement with a team.

"There's not going to be anybody to finance a stadium until you have a team, so it's a waste of our time," Semcken said. "We do have a plan after talking to investment bankers, who said this will be easy to finance. We're really not worried about it. We have a plan, and that plan will go into effect once we have a team. Our finance plan assumes we only have one team and only play 10 games. That's all. To have a financing plan in place until you have a team is silly."

This is one of the many fundamental differences between the downtown and Industry plans. Leiweke believes you must have a diverse events center, not just a football stadium, capable of hosting 50 events a year ranging from Super Bowls and Finals Fours to major conventions and trade shows to make the project financially feasible for all parties involved. Semcken and Roski contend their financing plan for an open-air football stadium will be sufficient if they host nothing more than 10 NFL games a year.

No matter who you side with, this much is certain, neither has the financing currently in place to begin construction tomorrow.

"You have a site in the City of Industry, which had some momentum from a regulatory standpoint but really can't find the financing solution just yet," Grubman said. "And you have another quite attractive site in downtown L.A., which has the backing of some very, very capable people and it has momentum from the standpoint of the city and the county but it also does not have a financing solution in place."

Leiweke agrees the fate of both stadium proposals hinges on financing and believes it's the reason the diverse downtown project will eventually be built instead of the football-centric site in Industry.

"This is all about financing. Period. End of story," Leiweke said. "Forget all the other stuff about the location, who's going to build it and so on. Believe me, you don't have banks asking, 'How are you going to get everyone in there?' What they care about the most is can you generate the revenue to make a $1 billion private investment payoff. That's what they care about. What they care about the most is contractually obligated income. Period. That's the whole game."

While the artist renderings of the Industry stadium feature sample signage for Sony, Miller and Grey Goose, among others, the site has yet to get any official sponsors or naming right deals, which would help toward the financing. Leiweke, on the other hand, is reportedly close to completing a naming rights deal for the downtown stadium worth at least $600 million over 30 years, in addition to other "founding partner" deals with other companies, which could put the total sponsorship figure close to the estimated $1 billion price tag for the stadium.

Semcken was less than impressed with the projected naming rights figures.

"Twenty million a year in naming rights is embarrassing. We would never do that. That's much too low and it's frankly bad business before you have team," Semcken said.

The biggest problem the Industry group has with Leiweke's finances is his promise that the project won't cost taxpayer's a penny. Semcken claims "AEG is expecting taxpayers to dole out well over a billion dollars for a proposal that will compromise the city's general fund."

Leiweke shakes his head at what he terms the "fear tactics" of his opponents while explaining the plan he laid out to receptive council members last week. AEG will completely pay for the cost stadium, even if it is more than the $1 billion projection. Before building the stadium, however, it will tear down the west hall of the convention center and build a $350 million replacement. To do that Leiweke wants the city to float $350 million in bonds to help finance the project, which he guarantees to repay with revenue from the stadium.

AEG owns, operates and consults with more than 100 venues worldwide from Los Angeles and Miami to London and Shanghai.

"This is an exact replica of the Staples Center model where we first tore down the North Hall of the convention center," Leiweke said. "They're talking about the parking lots under the West Hall and digging under there and how expensive that is. What are they talking about? There was a parking lot below the convention center at Staples Center. They don't think we get that? We took down the old North Hall and its underground parking lot before we built Staples Center there. Last time I checked there also used to be structures where L.A. Live is. We get how to build things. We build more of these than anyone in the world."

City of Industry Courtesy of Roski GroupAn artist's rendering of the proposed stadium 20 miles from downtown in the City of Industry.

TIMELINE

Leiweke, battling a cold on this overcast day earlier this month, explaining his vision between sips of coffee, finally laughs when he's reminded of the 90-day deadline he imposed on this project nearly 60 days ago.

"We're not going to have a team in the next three months. We know that," Leiweke said. "We've said that from Day 1. We just want to have an outline of an agreement."

While some have questioned the commintment of billionaire Philip Anschutz, the principal financial backer of the downtown project, Leiweke said Anschutz is committed to the project and will actually choose the architect to design the building this month. His commitment, however, is still contingent on the outlined agreement Leiweke has stated.

"This misnomer that he hasn't approved this is wrong. He's approved it as long as we get the right deal done with the city, the right deal done with the league, the right deal done with a team and get the contractually obligated income," Leiweke said. "Some of that is not going to happen in the next three months, nor did we say it is."

Everyone involved with bringing the NFL back to Los Angeles, whether it be in downtown or Industry, understands nothing will happen with the NFL until the league and the player's union come to their own agreement. Forget about relocation, teams can't even trade players until a new CBA is approved. It's a process that could very well drag on through the spring and summer, depending on how contentious discussions get. The delay actually works in the downtown group's favor since it officially began this process about three months ago unlike the group in Industry, which has been at this for three years now.

“Leiweke This is all about financing. Period. End of story.” -- AEG president Tim Leiweke

While AEG has yet to choose an architectural design (it narrowed its choices to three last month), Roski has been showing off detailed artist renderings and meticulous models of his site since announcing his plans at an April 2008 news conference at Staples Center with, ironically enough, the west hall of the Los Angeles Convention Center serving as a backdrop. Roski not only owns the 600-acre lot on the northern side of the 57 and 60 freeway interchange where he wants to build his $800 million, 75,000-seat stadium, but he has two approved environmental impact reports and is ready to begin construction as soon as he gets a team.

Leiweke, however, said he has been working closely with the league on the downtown project and believes it will be in position to get a team and begin construction after the league resolves its labor dispute. He said it will become clear soon that downtown is the site the NFL wants to return to.

"I think if we do this right, within my timeline, we'll hopefully make a couple of announcements and when we do, I think once and for all, it will be game, set and match," Leiweke said. "People can shoot at us but we will have proven that it works, that the vision is right and that the league supports it. Is [NFL commissioner] Roger Goodell ever going to come out and say this is my site and this is the only site and that's it? No. But I can assure you if we hit some of the marks we're going to hit in the next couple months it will be clear that those marks were hit with the help of and in conjunction with the NFL."

LOCATION

Nine years ago, Roski, Leiweke and Wasserman sat side by side on a dais inside Staples Center to announce plans for a downtown football stadium within walking distance of the arena. Back then, the open-air stadium would have cost $450 million (with a similar financing plan as Staples and the current events center proposal) and seated 64,000 fans. The bid, however, was scrapped less than a month later amid political opposition and resistance from the city-owned Coliseum, which still had dreams of attracting an NFL team.

When Roski talks about a downtown football stadium now, he doesn't cite political opposition or the Coliseum as reasons his bid faded away in 2002. In one interview, he said he passed on the idea because the location simply didn't work. In another interview, he said the NFL contacted the group after the announcement and said the league wasn't interested in going downtown, citing a need for fans to have areas to tailgate.

Leiweke and Roski remember the events differently. Roski has spent $17 million over the past three years on the Industry project, but Leiweke said he hopes his old friend and business partner will soon support the downtown cause again instead of trying to tear it down.

"We know this has been Ed's passion. We get it," Leiweke said. "I'm hoping Ed wakes up one day and understands if this is truly about getting the NFL back here, that this is probably now where it's going to happen."

If there is one key phrase Roski and Semcken have embedded in their brains after dealing with the NFL for the past 15 years, it is "fan experience." Industry's artist renderings don't so much resemble a football stadium as they do a theme park with a football field.

IT'S L.A., AND IT'S LIVE

ESPNLosAngeles.com For more coverage of the complete Los Angeles sports scene, visit ESPNLA.com. »

"We came up with all these ideas for fan experience in the parking area, with the wave pool and the gondolas, where you can fly over the site and the concert stages and the NFL Experience with punt, pass and kick, and the BMX bike course, and the Harley Davidson Café and the hot rod areas," Semcken said.

"We're giving the tailgate experience steroids. We're going to do things nobody has ever thought of."

Leiweke has seen the artist renderings from Industry and says he is amused by the fanciful paintings more than anything else.

"I can show you all kinds of designs with water wheels and theme parks and gondolas, but it's not going to happen for 8-10 games a year," said Leiweke, who contends that building a $3 billion campus for 10 games a year doesn't work. "This district [L.A. Live] works because we have 400 events a year. This district will work even better if we have 450 events a year."

Leiweke said there will be plenty of room for fans to park with 32,000 spaces available within a 15-minute walk of Staples Center, currently more than the slated spaces that will be built in Industry. While Semcken doesn't doubt Leiweke's number, he questions what kind of "fan experience" it would be for those people parking above and below ground who will be unable to tailgate. Leiweke said there will be ample room for those desiring to tailgate the old-fashioned way but envisions the Los Angeles tailgating experience will be taken to another level with the amenities and facilities already available at L.A. Live.

"We have a 100-acre campus, and when they see the design they'll see we have a lot of public space to tailgate," Leiweke said. "Not only will there be room to tailgate but L.A. Live is the ultimate tailgate party and we're already built. We don't need to build it for 10 or 20 days a year, it's built for 365 days a year."

The other potential problems with a downtown stadium would be the increased traffic in the area and the potential for a gridlocked mess if an NFL game were to take place at the same time as a Lakers, Kings or Clippers game. Leiweke promises no event will be booked at Staples Center the same time as an NFL game, kiddingly saying he knows the guy who books the arena. He also says anyone who has driven to downtown on Saturday or Sunday knows there's rarely any traffic to speak of.

"When you have 350,000 people that work downtown every day, traffic is not an issue [on the weekend]. It's just a smoke screen," Leiweke said. "That's just a fear tactic."

If the war of words between Leiweke and Semcken sounds personal at times it's because it is at this point. While Leiweke and Roski have been respectful of one another in their public comments, the same cannot always be said for Semcken, who called Leiweke a "bad guy," or Leiweke, who had to bite his tongue before calling Semcken something worse. Things escalated between the two groups shortly after Leiweke and Wasserman announced their downtown stadium plan in April. One month later Roski hired Florida-based media strategist Ben Porritt, who was a national spokesperson for the McCain-Palin campaign. Porritt, who was also the press secretary for House majority leader Tom DeLay, did have some experience in sports. As the president of the communication firm Outside Eyes, he personally helped Alex Rodriguez craft his interviews and news conferences after Rodriquez admitted to taking performance enhancing drugs two years ago.

"Instead of getting into a war of words and instead of us hiring PR consultants … we're going to focus on what we're doing," Leiweke said. "We're not out bad-mouthing anyone personally. We're just not going to do that, because that means you're making the decision for the wrong reason."

PROBABILITY

So when will we know the NFL is returning to Los Angeles? Well, there will be two big indicators long before a team loads up the moving vans. The day shovels hit the dirt in either downtown or Industry would undoubtedly begin the countdown since both groups have stated construction is contingent upon a team agreeing to move into their venue and there's no way they would begin such a process until they had a firm commitment. The second is if either group buys into an NFL team, as both sides have stated their only interest in a team would be moving one to Los Angeles.

Perhaps the likeliest candidate to move at the moment is the San Diego Chargers, only a two-hour drive down the Interstate 5. Chargers owner Alex Spanos has been trying to sell a stake in his team and it's unlikely the Chargers will ever get a new publically financed stadium, something they've been trying to get for nearly a decade. The Chargers can announce their intentions to leave San Diego between Feb. 1 and April 30 of each year through 2020 if they pay off the bonds used to expand Qualcomm Stadium in 1997, which currently would be approximately $26 million. The Chargers' last best hope of moving into a new proposed stadium in downtown San Diego isn't expected to get much political support due to its need for public financing and may not even make it onto the ballots if California Gov. Jerry Brown is successful in eliminating redevelopment agencies as a source of public financing.

If the Chargers' dreams of a new downtown stadium in San Diego are killed, they would likely look to get out of their stadium lease after the 2011 season and could conceivably play in the Los Angeles Coliseum -- their first home when they began as the Los Angeles Chargers in 1960 -- for two years while their new home is being built.

"We'd welcome them with open arms," said Coliseum general manager Pat Lynch. "We'd need to do some modifications but we'd be ready, willing and able to accommodate them for as long as they needed."

The Chargers already have some history with Wasserman and AEG. Two years ago the Chargers signed a deal with the Wasserman Media Group to help market the team in Los Angeles and Orange County and help sell luxury suites and club seats in the area. And for two years after the AEG-owned Home Depot Center opened in 2003, the Chargers held their training camp at the $150 million sports complex in Carson.

So which venue will become a reality and which one will join the 18 others before it that have failed? Ask both groups and they'll say their stadium will be built and their opponents don't have a chance. Ask those who have followed this nearly two-decade-long saga and they'll say it doesn't really matter until the relocation papers are signed and even then they won't believe it until the league plays its first game in Los Angeles since Christmas Eve 1994.

Leiweke, however, smiles as he stands up, looking again outside of his window at what he believes will be the future site of Los Angeles' NFL team by 2015.

"By the time we hit the Super Bowl we're going to have an announcement that proves to everyone once and for all that this project is going to happen," Leiweke said. "It's going to be private and it's going to be brilliant and it's going to happen."

Read More: http://sports.espn.go.com/los-angeles/nfl/news/story?id=6053126

milquetoast

January 31st, 2011, 02:58 PM

Nice great big article! Informative and satisfying. Looking forward to Tuesday.

Franchise646

February 1st, 2011, 12:25 AM

They sat together every Saturday and Sunday morning -- the Hollywood mogul and the wide-eyed kid soaking in his every word.

Lew Wasserman would walk through the glass doors of Nate 'n Al, the famed Beverly Hills delicatessen which has doubled as Hollywood's cafeteria for the past 65 years, with his grandson, Casey, by his side at 7:30 a.m. They would quickly be seated at table 31, Lew's favorite booth, located just in front of the wooden pole in the middle of the diner, with Lew always facing the door, his oversized, black-rim glasses visible from a block away.

Wasserman's order never changed. It only doubled when he brought in his young protégé. On weekends he would order two pumpernickel bagels, a hefty scoop of cream cheese and a couple of slices of bacon. He would then proceed to make his favorite breakfast for himself and Casey, spreading the cream cheese inside the bagel and meticulously crumpling the bacon on top.

Lew and Casey would have breakfast nearly every weekend from the time Casey was three years old until the day Lew died in 2002 at 89 years old, when Casey was 28. The two-hour breakfasts were more than simply quality time between a grandfather and his grandson; they were the 25-year education of a man who would one day become almost as influential as his grandfather, in a field Lew Wasserman loved and with which he wished he had been more involved.

When it comes to the NFL's return to Los Angeles there is no shortage of questions. Paramount among them, of course, is the obvious one: Will it ever happen? After 16 years without an NFL team, the skepticism in the city surrounding every fairy tale rendering and hopeless proposal is certainly understandable.

There is perhaps only one consensus amongst those who have followed this soap opera. If the NFL ever does return to Los Angeles, Casey Wasserman will likely be involved.

You won't find Wasserman at many news conferences for the currently proposed downtown stadium, which would replace the old West Hall of the Los Angeles Convention Center next to Staples Center, although the 75,000-seat, retractable roof complex was his brainchild.

You won't read many stories of him promoting the virtues of the venue to politicians and league officials, although he has done just that behind closed doors to individuals he doesn't think of as politicians and league officials but rather as friends and confidants.

You won't see or hear much from Wasserman until he feels there is something to be seen or heard. That's just the way he is.

Lew Wasserman
AP PhotoHollywood mogul Lew Wasserman was key in the development of his grandson Casey Wasserman's business acumen.

And just the way the fiercely private Lew Wasserman was, as well.

"He influenced me in countless ways," Casey Wasserman said of his grandfather. "My earliest days of passion around the NFL were tied around going to Super Bowls with him and experiencing the sport with him. My connection to football really started around him."

Lew Wasserman is remembered as Hollywood's last great mogul, equally the most powerful and feared man in show business at the height of his tenure atop MCA, but he easily could have carved a similarly imposing figure as a sports owner. On at least three separate occasions Wasserman nearly purchased a stake in an NFL team in Los Angeles.

MCA founder Jules Stein reportedly nixed a deal Wasserman had with Los Angeles Rams owner Dan Reeves, a deal which would have given Wasserman 50 percent of the team in the early 1960s, because Stein didn't believe it would have been an appropriate move for him and the company. In the early 1980s, Wasserman served as a court-appointed mediator while Al Davis tried to move the Oakland Raiders to Los Angeles and one of the possible outcomes would have made Wasserman a part owner of a Los Angeles expansion franchise with the Raiders staying in Oakland. Nearly a decade later, Wasserman considered buying a minority stake in the Raiders if they relocated to Hollywood Park before Davis eventually moved the team back to Oakland.

Lew's last attempt at buying into the NFL had little to do with his need to be involved with the league he loved. His hope was to get Casey, who was a student at UCLA at the time, a front-office position so he could learn the inner workings of an NFL franchise and one day run his own team with the same zeal Lew ran MCA.

When Lew's friend and right-hand man Sonny Werblin left MCA in 1965, completing a successful 33-year run with the company during which he ran and revolutionized the television department, Werblin and four associates purchased the New York Titans for $1 million. Werblin later changed the name of the team to the New York Jets and spent $427,000 to induce University of Alabama quarterback Joe Namath to pass up the established NFL for the upstart Jets and the much-maligned American Football Conference. Werblin would mold the image of "Broadway Joe" just as he had molded the images of clients such as Elizabeth Taylor and Johnny Carson and built the team which would usher in the NFL-AFL merger and the Super Bowl. As Howard Cosell once said of Werblin, "He single-handedly changed the face of sports in America." Werblin would later build and manage the $340 million Meadowlands Sports Complex in New Jersey and become the chairman of Madison Square Garden, momentarily rejuvenating the moribund New York Knicks and Rangers during his tenure. Werblin's post-MCA career always highlighted the one area of the company Wasserman was never able to build.

"Lew was intensely competitive even within his own company," said Dennis McDougal, who authored the Wasserman biography "The Last Mogul." "When Werblin split off and made this leap into professional sports that ticked off Lew. One of Lew's dreams during the last 25 years of his career was to turn MCA somehow into a sports super power in addition to dominating TV, radio and motion pictures. But that was a dream he was never able to achieve. He was never able to take MCA into big-time sports and he was never able to get MCA to purchase a television network. Those were the two big failures in an otherwise incredibly sterling career."

Lew had long hoped to have a son to whom he could one day leave his empire. In a rare interview with Los Angeles magazine in 1979, Wasserman went so far as to say, "I was unfortunate not to have a son, only a daughter." His daughter, Lynne, would marry stockbroker Jack Meyrowitz in 1970. Six months after their marriage they changed their last name to Meyers. Four years later they welcomed their son, Casey Meyers. When Casey was 7 years old his parents divorced and he was essentially raised by his mother. The undisputed father figure in his life was Lew. Lew was the father Casey was missing and Casey was the son Lew had always yearned for.

When Casey turned 21 in 1995 he changed his last name to Wasserman. He had a strained relationship at best with his father, who had moved to Palm Desert, Calif., and was convicted of acting as a courier in a 1989 money-laundering scheme, and Casey was essentially raised as a Wasserman for as long as he could remember. On his 21st birthday he also received a multimillion dollar trust fund and was named the president of the Wasserman Foundation, the family's charitable organization, which has assets exceeding $230 million.

It would have been easy for Casey to kick back, become a socialite and degenerate into tabloid fodder like many other trust fund babies in Hollywood, but he was too much like Lew, who was a workaholic until his dying day. Lew's legendary 60-hour workweeks and commitment to philanthropy still shape Casey, who is on a dozen boards of directors and donates millions to charities ranging from the arts to educational programs.

The only area Casey didn't follow in his grandfather's footsteps was getting involved in show business. Lew was fine with this after seeing where his company and the business was going after selling MCA in 1990 to Matsushita Electric, a Japanese consumer electronics conglomerate now known as Panasonic, which sold it less than five years later to now defunct liquor giant Seagram.

(Interestingly enough, talent agent and Creative Arts Agency founder Michael Ovitz, who idolized Lew growing up but grew into an enemy, brokered the sale of MCA to Matsushita, and would later lead the group which was Los Angeles' last real hope for an NFL team in 1999.)

Lew nurtured the idea of Casey one day changing the landscape of sports.

"The ways he influenced me in life paint how I do everything," Wasserman said recently from his office overlooking Wilshire Boulevard. "It's how I approach lots of ideas and opportunities whether they be football or non-football related. My approach to business, my approach to relationships and my approach to problem solving is all driven by him."

Lew's influence drove more than business decisions in Casey's life. Casey would marry movie music supervisor Laura Ziffren, the granddaughter of one of Lew's closest confidants, Paul Ziffren, a prominent attorney who died in 1991 and who had played a major role in bringing the 1960 Democratic National Convention and the 1984 Summer Olympics to Los Angeles.

Even though Lew never owned an NFL team, he was always around NFL types, which meant Casey was always around NFL types. Lew would take Casey with him to the Super Bowl every year where he and his wife Edie would be guests of their longtime friend, NFL commissioner Pete Rozelle.

When Casey was 10 years old he befriended a 25-year-old assistant in the NFL public relations department by the name of Roger Goodell, who became the NFL commissioner in 2006. The two became fast friends and Goodell was the one who introduced Casey to Arena Football League commissioner David Baker and recommended he become the owner of a Los Angeles franchise. The 24-year-old Wasserman would become the youngest owner in sports, buying into the league for $5 million in October 1998 to start the Los Angeles Avengers. Goodell would later send his young friend an oversized picture of the 1932 NFL Championship Game, which was not only the league's first playoff game but also the first indoor football game, held inside Chicago Stadium due to inclement weather. The symbolism was clear -- the NFL playoffs were born indoors and the same would be true of Wasserman's career in professional football.

If Casey Wasserman's weekend breakfasts with his grandfather were the equivalent of going to business school, mastering the art of deal-making through osmosis and guidance, his 10-year run in the Arena Football League was like getting a doctorate in sports management. No one else currently positioning themselves to be involved with Los Angeles' next NFL team has hired and fired a head football coach, named an expansion team and designed football uniforms as Wasserman did with the Avengers. The AFL is not the NFL, but Kurt Warner would be the first to argue it can certainly serve as a breeding ground for success at the next level.

"I operated a professional football team in L.A. By no means was it the NFL, but I understand what it takes on some level to build and operate a professional sports enterprise in Los Angeles," Wasserman said. "Obviously as a part of that I had experiences with lots of NFL owners because they owned Arena Football teams, too. The only way to get experience is to do it and from that perspective I have experience."

Wasserman didn't just turn the Avengers into one of the AFL's signature franchises, he quickly moved up the ranks within the league's offices. He was named the chairman of the league's labor committee and saved the 2000 season after owners voted to cancel the season when they couldn't come to a labor agreement with players. Wasserman's all-night negotiating session to save the season and potentially the league was reminiscent of his grandfather's ability to resolve labor disputes in Hollywood. He also chaired the committee which negotiated television deals to get the AFL unprecedented national exposure on NBC and ESPN.

In the long run, however, Wasserman wasn't able to save the AFL which suspended operations in 2009 in the midst of a difficult economic climate. He shifted his attention to the Wasserman Media Group, a sports and entertainment agency which he founded in 2002 and now operates out of nine cities across the world, from its home base in Los Angeles to satellite offices in New York, London and Mumbai.

Launching a new company in a very competitive industry, dominated by the likes of IMG and the William-Morris Agency, Wasserman managed to land some of the best and the brightest from each division in sports, beginning with naming rights and marketing firm Envision in 2002 and action sports athlete representation firm The Familie in 2005. Wasserman then acquired the NBA and MLB player representation practices of former SFX Sports CEO Arn Tellem in 2006, followed by the acquisition of the soccer, rugby, marketing and events divisions of SFX Sports Group, Europe, making WMG one of the dominant players around the world.

"He's more than money, I can tell you that," said Darren Rovell, CNBC's sports business reporter. "He's more than a guy who has money and just wanted to be cool and start a sports agency. There are a lot of people who have money and decided to start a sports agency just to be jock sniffers and he's not in that class. He's a very smart guy and very strategic. He's a businessman before he's a sports businessman."

In addition to representing more than 800 athletes in more than 20 sports, Wasserman clients include the New York Jets, the New York Giants, T-Mobile, American Express, Tottenham Hotspur of the English Premier League and Northern Trust. The company, which was selected to sell the naming rights to the New Meadowlands Stadium after brokering the historic $180 million deal to name Emirates Stadium in London, home of the Arsenal Football Club, continues to specialize in athlete representation, property sales and corporate and property consulting.

"My goal was to build a meaningful sports business that operates at the highest levels in the areas of business that we compete in," Wasserman said. "I have an intense desire to be successful and I'm extremely competitive. I'm fortunate enough to wake up every day and go to sleep every night working in a business that I'm passionate about. If I wasn't passionate about it I'm not sure I'd be working as hard."

Casey Wasserman says he doesn't remember his first foray into bringing the NFL back to Los Angeles. He says he has no recollection of the news conference on May 16, 2002, inside the Chick Hearn Media Room of Staples Center, where a 28-year-old Wasserman sat between billionaire developer Ed Roski and AEG president and CEO Tim Leiweke to announce plans to build a football stadium next to Staples Center.

"I'm not sure what press conference you're talking about," Wasserman said.

Back then the proposed stadium, which looked like a smaller version of the New Meadowlands Stadium, would seat 64,000 and cost $450 million. It was Wasserman who pitched the plan to prospective partners Roski, Leiweke and supermarket mogul Ron Burkle. Roski and Burkle had unsuccessfully tried to bring the NFL back to Los Angeles before and had all but given up on the idea of building a new stadium for an NFL team when Wasserman came to them with the idea of building a stadium in South Park along 11th Street. The plan seemed like a no-brainer. They had purchased options for the land, Goodell was prepared to earmark the project for $150 million from the NFL's stadium fund and Los Angeles mayor James K. Hahn endorsed the project at the news conference, saying, "I'm really excited to bring the NFL back to Los Angeles. The plan you outlined represents the best chance we have to do that."

It seemed the NFL was destined to return to Los Angeles. Leiweke at one point even looked at the baby-faced Wasserman, who despite being the mastermind behind the project was ignored by most of the media who were more interested in speaking with established figures like Roski, Leiweke and Hahn. "If this works, Casey gets all the credit," Leiweke said. "If it doesn't, he gets all the blame."

Of course, it didn't work. It never seems to work in Los Angeles no matter how perfect the project appears. The proposed stadium actually flamed out quicker than any of its predecessors. Not even a month after the news conference to announce the project and unveil artist renderings of the stadium, AEG and the rest of the partners withdrew their plan amidst political opposition (Hahn and council member Jan Perry would be the only elected official to publically endorse the proposal) and unexpected competition from the Coliseum, which the NFL had already said was not a viable option for a team.

Just before losing out on bringing the NFL back to Los Angeles, however, Wasserman suffered the toughest loss of his life. On June 2, 2002, Lew Wasserman died of complications from a stroke. It was the first family member Wasserman had ever lost and it was unquestionably the most important figure in his life. To honor his late grandfather, Wasserman's Avengers wore black "LRW" patches on their jerseys the rest of the 2002 season; that season the team made the playoffs for the first time in its history.

As difficult as that one-month stretch was, Lew Wasserman had always preached the importance of persistence and anticipation to his grandson and Casey wasn't about to give up on his dream of bringing the NFL back to Los Angeles after one failed attempt.

"This is a complicated problem to bring a team back to L.A.," Wasserman said. "Frankly the solution we had back then was a complicated solution which required a lot of different things to fall into place to have success, which makes almost anything impossible. It's not complicated why two teams left and if you're not solving the problem why two teams left you're never going to solve the problem to attract a team back."

The idea seems so clear and simple to Wasserman, as he describes it now. He can't help but begin his sentences with "Look" and insert "Right?" after every statement to make sure it's as clear and simple to you, as well.

Wasserman had driven past the old West Hall of the Convention Center countless times over the past decade while going to Avengers games at Staples Center, but something was different this time as he drove around the hall before a meeting with Leiweke about two years ago.

"I don't know what made me think any differently that time than any other time," Wasserman said. "Maybe because it was during the daytime and usually when I go to Staples Center it's at night for an event."

Suddenly the detached West Hall, the oldest and most rundown part of the Los Angeles Convention Center, stuck out like an eyesore as he looked around at Staples Center, the Nokia Theatre and L.A. Live, now complete with the JW Marriott and Ritz Carlton Residences. Wasserman began looking at the area and picturing what a modern football stadium would look like in place of the relic that currently stood there.

"It seemed like an obvious place," Wasserman said. "If it fit it would make great sense, but I had no idea if it would fit or not."

After sketching a few outlines and drawing up a few versions on his computer, Wasserman took the idea to an architect who overlaid all 31 NFL stadiums over the site and amazingly enough they all fit, Wasserman said.

Wasserman took the idea to Leiweke, who was not only intrigued by the location and the business it could create for L.A. Live and, most importantly, AEG's newly built hotels and residences across the street, but by the retractable roof. They were no longer talking about an open air stadium for 10 NFL games but a climate-controlled events center which could host 50 events, ranging from conventions and trade shows to Super Bowls and Final Fours.

"One of the reasons there's not a team in L.A. is people have failed to make economic sense of the opportunity and one of the ways to make the economics more interesting is to create a venue that has a much more diverse capability to host events and has more economic generating power," Wasserman said. "Putting it where there's already an infrastructure is a huge advantage and putting a roof on it and connecting it to the convention center is the other way. Those two things make the economics of this idea unique relative to other ideas presented in L.A. and therefore give this a better chance of success."

Leiweke first met Wasserman at a political function at Casey's grandfather's house in 1996. In fact, most of Wasserman's influential friends past the age of 40, from former president Bill Clinton to former Dodgers owner Peter O'Malley, can trace their dealings with Casey through an introduction by Lew. Casey, however, has been able to sustain and grow those relationships long after a fleeting introduction with a charm and an air about him which prompted GQ magazine to compare him to Tom Cruise and the Kennedys.

While Lew often ruled with an iron fist and struck fear in the hearts of many he did business with, Casey carries himself with a refined kindness which belies the cutthroat business he has thrived in. Even those who have traded barbs with Leiweke and questioned the downtown stadium have a hard time finding anything bad to say about Wasserman.

"I think Casey has been very successful in his career," said John Semcken, vice president of Majestic Realty, who along with Roski is currently looking to build a football stadium in the City of Industry. "Of all of us, Casey actually owned a team that many other NFL owners owned and Casey's friends with the [NFL] commissioner. Casey does have some significant knowledge of football and how the operations work."

It's the reason Leiweke jumped at the chance to build a football stadium with Wasserman in 2002 and the reason he's willing to go to bat with him again now.

"He's well respected, he's well liked, he's well connected and he's experienced," Leiweke said. "I've never heard anyone say anything bad about Casey. Maybe his wife once or twice while she was mad at him, but Casey is extremely well respected."

At a recent charity event in Beverly Hills, O'Malley and Larry King gushed over Wasserman and the possibility of the kid they've known since he was knee high bringing the NFL back to Los Angeles.

"Casey would be a great owner," said King, who was a Sunday morning regular at Nate 'n Al's along with the Wassermans. "They don't come any better than Casey Wasserman. He learned from the best in Lew."

Wasserman's dream to build a football stadium was first hatched over those Sunday morning pumpernickel bagels with his grandfather growing up. If his dream becomes a reality, he will be spending many Sunday mornings in the fall walking around the completion of his vision, telling his children about their great grandfather and how dreams can come true. It would be the kind of fairy tale ending to a Hollywood story Lew Wasserman made a living putting on the silver screen.

http://sports.espn.go.com/los-angeles/nfl/news/story?id=6057997

Ladies and Gentlemen, Girls and Boys may I introduce you to "Farmers Field" what we may start calling "The Farm".

http://www.variety.com/article/VR1118031255

Exclusive: Los Angeles might not yet have an NFL team, but it does have a stadium name.

At a press conference Tuesday morning, local politicians and NFL officials will announce that the city's proposed downtown football venue will be called Farmers Field.

According to sources, naming rights have been bought by Farmers Insurance Group for an undisclosed amount. The Los Angeles Times recently reported that AEG was eyeing a naming rights pact in the neighborhood of $20 million a year, with annual increases.

The possibility of a Farmers-NFL connection in L.A. was first reported earlier this month by Sports Illustrated writer Peter King.

If the project goes forward, the venue will be built on the site that is currently the West Hall of the Los Angeles Convention Center.

The stadium would be owned by AEG, led by media mogul Philip Anschutz and president Tim Leiweke. Both have long wanted to land an NFL team in Los Angeles and have always suggested that its L.A. Live complex is a prime location.

Los Angeles has been without a football team since 1994, when the Los Angeles Raiders moved back to Oakland. There has been talk ever since in having a team move back to the country's second-largest television market, but nothing has ever come to fruition. There were efforts in both Irwindale and Inglewood -- where Hollywood Park racetrack currently stands -- to build a stadium, yet those plans never moved forward.

Depending on how quickly the financing comes together, the stadium, which would have a retractable roof, could be complete as soon 2015 or as late as 2018.

Among those attending Tuesday's news conference will be Leiweke, Casey Wasserman, L.A. Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa and former Laker great Magic Johnson, who sold part of his stake in the Lakers in order to be a possible participant in a Los Angeles-based NFL teams.

Teams that have been discussed moving to L.A. include the San Diego Chargers, Minnesota Vikings, Carolina Panthers and Jacksonville Jaguars.

AEG's L.A. Live complex, adjacent to the convention center, includes Staples Center and the Nokia Theater.

Farmers Insurance has been ponying more sponsorship coin in and around L.A. recently, inking a three-year title sponsorship deal with the Southern California Tennis Assn. that renamed the ATP World Tour 250 the Farmers Classic through 2012. Event is held at UCLA.

Company also stepped in to serve as the title sponsor of the PGA Tour's San Diego golf tournament through 2014, replacing longtime sponsor Buick. Event, which was held this past weekend at Torrey Pines, aired on CBS.

(Marc Graser contributed to this report.)

slipperydog

February 1st, 2011, 09:35 AM

Is anyone going to be able to get video of this and post it here? I'm going to miss the press conference, but I know FSWest should have it live. Would like to see as much of it as possible. Thanks in advance for any assistance

Franchise646

February 1st, 2011, 11:53 PM

Podcast of the Event here :

http://sports.espn.go.com/los-angeles/nfl/news/story?id=6078709

vahebaronian

February 2nd, 2011, 12:10 AM

Farmers Field Website
http://www.farmersfield.com/

saiholmes

February 2nd, 2011, 07:03 AM

'United front' announces stadium naming-rights deal
Mayor Villaraigosa, sports legends and other city and business leaders join AEG chief Tim Leiweke at event trumpeting $700-million deal with Farmers and making it sound as if the NFL is for sure coming back.
By Lance Pugmire, Los Angeles Times
7:41 PM PST, February 1, 2011

At a stadium naming-rights announcement that took on the life of a pep rally, complete with a giant airship and mock football field, Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, Los Angeles sports legends, and other business and city leaders did everything they could Tuesday to convince the converted that the NFL was coming back to Los Angeles.

It was a morning of self-congratulatory speeches, videotaped messages and even a claim that building a downtown stadium would "save lives."

Villaraigosa, who had previously been silent on the proposed Convention Center stadium project, made his position known.

"It is very clear football is coming back to Los Angeles," he said.

The reason for the revelry was to announce the name of the proposed 70,000-seat retractable-roof stadium as Farmers Field. The 30-year naming-rights deal with Farmers Insurance is worth $700 million, with the possibility of growing to $900 million if two NFL teams relocate to the proposed stadium.

No questions were permitted at the announcement until Los Angeles Rams legends Deacon Jones and Rosey Grier, Hall of Fame running back Jim Brown, Lakers legend Magic Johnson and boxer Oscar De La Hoya finished their photo-op holding footballs on a Convention Center stage.

Johnson, the first speaker, said the show of unity was orchestrated by AEG President and Chief Executive Tim Leiweke.

"That's the most important message we can send," said Johnson, who would like to own a piece of whatever team would move here. "In years past, we were not united and it cost us. We're united — the public and private sectors, the City Council, the unions, business leaders and the community.

"That's the sentiment all over the city. It's not just us up here, but the fans … want it bad. It'll take all of us. We've sent a clear message that we're a united front and this is what we can do now."

Bold statements booming into microphones defined the announcement, as Villaraigosa and Leiweke repeated the claim that not "one dime" of taxpayer money (from the city general fund) will be used to tear down and rebuild the aged L.A. Convention Center's West Hall and construct the $1-billion stadium on the dime of AEG's billionaire owner Philip Anschutz.

What about traffic jams? "Nonsense, false," touted a transportation official, showing video coverage of cars speeding along the 110 on two recent Sundays.

One labor authority projected 7,000 construction jobs will be created by the effort and vowed to get the work done "on budget, on schedule, right the first time," adding 8,000 more permanent jobs will be generated by the existence of Farmers Field.

In the context of hyping the appetite-whetting jobs claims in this economy, someone claimed the stadium will "save lives."

Perspective?

"I've seen quite a few stadium economic reports, and I've never seen that high a number," said Marc Ganis, a stadium expert and president of Sportscorp Ltd. in Chicago. "It's very hard to take these numbers at face value. They're never as good as the promoters claim and never as bad as some academics suggest.

"People might assume the 7,000 construction jobs mean those on the ground in L.A. building the stadium, but there might be subcontractors and some other manufacturing jobs done out of the area."

Such details were intended to be glossed over Tuesday. Leiweke, in a nod to critics of his project, including Ed Roski's group that aims to build a stadium in the City of Industry, said, "It's easy to shoot darts and cast fear." He pointed instead to AEG's success in building Staples Center and LA Live.

Roski was unavailable for comment, however, partner John Semcken, vice president of Majestic Realty, said: "We firmly believe that our stadium proposal, which is modeled after the most successful stadiums in the league, is best suited for the NFL and the entire Southern California region."

Los Angeles Councilwoman Jan Perry touted the downtown stadium project in her 9th District as "our own economic stimulus package … [to] generate tax dollars that our city desperately needs." Perry added, "If anyone can do a project of this magnitude, it's AEG."

Councilwoman Janice Hahn was among those poised to play a role in bringing the city an NFL team more than 50 years after her father, Kenneth Hahn, helped broker the Dodgers' move west. She vowed to preside over a "transparent" process that will include financial scrutiny by a City Council working group, an independent financial analyst and a ceremonial "blue-ribbon committee" that the mayor announced Tuesday. The project will require a $350-million bond for work on the convention center's West Hall.

Villaraigosa's blue-ribbon committee, including Sony Pictures Chairman Michael Lynton, Milwaukee Brewers owner Mark Attanasio, former Gov. Gray Davis and film producer/philanthropist Sherry Lansing, will advise him on the merits of the "Downtown Events Center."

Hahn said that was the only way "to convince the public the second largest city in America needs a football team. I say, let's huddle."

"The naming rights are a big deal, a game-changer," Villaraigosa said. "It dispels the notion we're not going to build — or can't build — a new stadium."

At least one NFL team would have to agree to move to Los Angeles before the stadium is built. Of course, this being Super Bowl week, no NFL owners were at Tuesday's event.

However, influential Dallas Cowboys owner Jerry Jones took notice of it from Texas.

"To me, that is a major indication of the viability of a franchise in Los Angeles," Jones said. "They're a very credible group there that is attempting to build a stadium, and certainly the kinds of things they're doing, within the framework of the financial dollars that I'm seeing and hearing about, should work.… I'd say that's a very serious, positive thing that they have there."

Villaraigosa revealed he met secretly with NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell in December to discuss the NFL-to-L.A. situation, and added that he's met with at least one league ownership group interested in moving.

The mayor declined to name who but noted, "You saw the pictures," in reference to a Tuesday video montage that included scenes of Minnesota Vikings running back Adrian Peterson and roaring San Diego Chargers fans.

The Vikings, Chargers, Jacksonville, St. Louis, San Francisco, Buffalo and Oakland are the teams believed most likely to move based on current stadium leases or lagging attendance. Leiweke said he's been in talks with the Rose Bowl and Coliseum about serving as a temporary home to a team that would move.

"There's a little bit of putting the cart before the horse here without a team," stadium expert Ganis said. "The unquestioned key is getting a team. Is there a team that will move?"

Leiweke insisted Farmers' investment will help sway an NFL owner: "I talk to them every day. They're all aware they get a piece of this if they move here."

Times staff writer Sam Farmer contributed to this report.

Read More: http://www.latimes.com/sports/la-sp-0202-la-nfl-20110202,0,5204557.story

saiholmes

February 3rd, 2011, 04:17 AM

yf8t_-qz3zY

milquetoast

February 3rd, 2011, 12:46 PM

^^ Fabulous video! LOOKING FOR THAT ELUSIVE CONVENTION CENTER TOUCHDOWN . http://i231.photobucket.com/albums/ee192/trolltoast/album%203/Fullscreencapture23201122111AM.jpg . DOWNTOWN LOS ANGELES — While the potential return of the NFL to Los Angeles is the news making headlines, speakers at a Tuesday press conference where AEG and Farmers Insurance announced their $700-million naming rights deal for “Farmers Field” were just as excited about the chance to finally energize the Los Angeles Convention Center, a facility that has always seemed to be one step away from greatness since opening in 1971.

Construction of AEG’s proposed stadium would require the demolition of the Convention Center’s original West Hall, space that the company has promised to replace via a new convention hall and multipurpose room in the stadium “events center.”
. http://i231.photobucket.com/albums/ee192/trolltoast/album%203/Fullscreencapture23201122118AM.jpg .
“I really look forward to this project because I know that this project is not about nine football games and a Super Bowl,” said Councilwoman Janice Hahn, chair of the City Council’s Trade, Commerce and Tourism committee. “It is about that, and it’s also about getting a new stadium, but … it’s about getting a brand new Convention Center.”

Even when this facility was brand new, though, the Los Angeles Convention Center was already behind the game.

Early Plans . Talk about the city’s need for a convention facility first began in the early 1940’s. World War II delayed planning slightly, but by the end of the decade backers had coalesced around the concept of building an auditorium and trade fair hall next to Bunker Hill. The facility would have risen on the blocks today occupied by the Bonaventure Hotel, Union Bank tower and the World Trade Center. Three times in the early 1950’s voters turned down propositions that would have funded the project.

In the 1960’s, simultaneous efforts were put into building convention center facilities in Elysian Park and underneath Exposition Park. 63 of Elysian Park’s 575 acres would have gone to the facility, which would have created 485,000 square feet of convention space. The proposal brought an outcry from citizens who valued the city’s green spaces.

The underground exhibit hall located a few miles down Figueroa would have added 250,000 square feet of open space, with meeting rooms to seat 7,300.

Both proposals were killed in August of 1966 when the City Council selected 31 acres at Pico and Figueroa as the center’s new home.

The Center Opens . On July 10, 1971, the city opened its new Los Angeles Convention and Exhibition Center, the building now known as the West Hall. A 700-voice choir sang as Mayor Sam Yorty cut the ribbon to dedicate the new facility.

Even once the site had been selected, getting it built had been no easy process. Councilman Marvin Braude objected strenuously to the plan put together to sell $38.5 million in bonds to construct the facility, calling it “an incredible tangle of unverified claims enticingly packaged in dazzling wrappings.”

His objections sound much like those of opponents of the stadium plan today. He worried that the city would end up on the hook for the bonds’ $47 million in interest if the facility failed to be self-supporting.

It turns out, he was right. By the end of the 1979 fiscal year the facility was running a $700,000 yearly deficit on its bond payments. Blamed for the losses was an office and hotel project that was supposed to have been built next door, the additional rooms making the facility more attractive to visiting conventions.

Expansion Plans . In 1980, the city spent $2.5 million to add 105,000 square feet to the Convention Center in the form of the North Hall, but already there was talk of a much larger expansion project to keep up with the growing size of marquee conventions.

A $350-million expansion plan approved in 1986 and opened in 1993 only ended up exacerbating the center’s financial woes. The green-glassed addition won acclaim for its design and the center’s new space, but the 1992 riots and the 1994 Northridge earthquake took a toll on convention bookings.

In 1996, Councilmembers struggling to balance the city’s budget were shocked to find themselves on the hook for a $21 million payment to cover debt payments at the Convention Center.

Again, the blame went to hotels. .
"The client reaction to the center is extremely favorable. The biggest single impediment in terms of selling the center is really the hotel industry," Convention and Visitors Bureau President George Kirkland told the L.A. Times. He pushed the city to develop a plan for hotels near the Convention Center.

In Steps the Arena . Only a few months later, developer Ed Roski sent the city a proposal to develop a $200-million arena on the site of the Convention Center’s North Hall. He asked that the city issue up to $70.5 million in bonds to pay for land that they would turn over to the arena developers, who would then privately finance a facility to become home to the NHL’s Kings—a team that Roski and Phil Anschutz had recently purchased out of bankruptcy—and the NBA’s Lakers.

The development team set an aggressive deadline, saying that construction would need to begin by September of 1997—just 13 months after the proposal was first made—in order to open for the 1999 basketball season. To make that happen, they told the city that they needed an answer in just two months. .
They did not get one. .
While the City Council fawned over the arena concept, Councilman Joel Wachs was the most vocal in balking at issuing bonds that the city could be left responsible to pay. Even Rita Walters, Councilwoman for the 9th district and an early proponent of the plan, eventually came out vocally against it.

As summer turned to fall in 1997, Kings President Tim Leiweke negotiated a deal that should sound very familiar in the current stadium debate: L.A. Arena Co. would guarantee to pay back any bond costs not covered by increased tax revenues.

With the current stadium plan, Leiweke, now CEO of AEG, came out of the gate promising that AEG would make the same deal on the $350-million in bonds that it expects the city to issue. That money would go toward building a new exhibit hall over Pico Blvd.

On Tuesday he reiterated that pledge, and said that he expects to pay out over the deal’s first few years. “And if there is ever a shortfall—and there will be on an annual basis, we predict—when there’s a shortfall, each and every year, on paying that debt service, Mayor, we will step up and we will pay the shortfall until the bonds are paid off,” Leiweke said. “We will never ask for a dollar from you, from the general fund or from the taxpayers. I promise.”
. http://i231.photobucket.com/albums/ee192/trolltoast/album%203/Fullscreencapture23201122059AM.jpg .
That promise was enough to get a deal done in 1997. The next few months should tell whether it is enough to get a deal done in 2011, and whether this time the deal is finally right to turn the Convention Center into the self-sustaining asset the city has always wanted. . ERIC RICHARDSON BLOGDOWNTOWN

Kenny

February 4th, 2011, 12:58 AM

urgh!

Westsidelife

February 5th, 2011, 09:14 PM

I love the idea of closing off Chick Hearn Court to vehicular traffic. It effectively creates one large city square.

http://farm6.static.flickr.com/5216/5417924376_22f2e5c3e3_b.jpg

soup or man

February 5th, 2011, 11:47 PM

They should've done that anyway considering that Chick Hearn is closed more than it's open. Add a bit more landscaping and you have a very nice plaza.

rockin'.baltimorean

February 6th, 2011, 03:02 AM

nice-lookin' stadium! looks like the jacksonville jaguars will be moving in 2012!!!!.......lol:okay:

rockin'.baltimorean

February 6th, 2011, 03:06 AM

......well, on 2nd thought, the metrodome roof collapsed before our very eyes, and the city of minneapolis is giving the vikings a hard time with getting a new stadium, so we'll see!

milquetoast

February 6th, 2011, 02:32 PM

That's the second time I've seen that stadium design used "officially" for illustrative purposes. Is this the one they've chosen?

klamedia

February 6th, 2011, 08:04 PM

What's next for AEG? Will they get an EIR exemption like Roski?

CITYofDREAMS

February 7th, 2011, 12:37 AM

I love the idea of closing off Chick Hearn Court to vehicular traffic. It effectively creates one large city square.

http://farm6.static.flickr.com/5216/5417924376_22f2e5c3e3_b.jpg

I'm really loving this... I see a third Olympic Games in LA.

slipperydog

February 7th, 2011, 02:01 AM

I am debating whether the new stadium plaza or the new Civic Center park would be a better location for a World Cup fan fest.

ryebreadraz

February 7th, 2011, 06:49 AM

I am debating whether the new stadium plaza or the new Civic Center park would be a better location for a World Cup fan fest.

They wouldn't be able to use the stadium plaza for any matches hosted at the stadium, but if we're talking about any World Cup, not necessarily hosted in the U.S., I'd take the stadium plaza. It would be more fun with all the stuff around it.

slipperydog

February 7th, 2011, 06:55 AM

They wouldn't be able to use the stadium plaza for any matches hosted at the stadium

Not that I'm necessarily disagreeing with you, but why is that? In any case, I am inclined to agree that the plaza would be great. Let's hope AEG sets something up for 2014/2018 etc.

Kenny

February 7th, 2011, 05:59 PM

I am debating whether the new stadium plaza or the new Civic Center park would be a better location for a World Cup fan fest.

I say both.

vahebaronian

February 7th, 2011, 06:58 PM

What's next for AEG? Will they get an EIR exemption like Roski?

Thats what they are trying to get, but the quite a bit of councilmen are not willing to lay down for AEG, stressing fiscal responsibility

ryebreadraz

February 7th, 2011, 11:26 PM

Not that I'm necessarily disagreeing with you, but why is that? In any case, I am inclined to agree that the plaza would be great. Let's hope AEG sets something up for 2014/2018 etc.

FIFA blocks off the area a certain number of yards from the stadium all the way around. A fan fest in the plaza would be too close to the stadium to meet FIFA's rules.

slipperydog

February 8th, 2011, 01:47 AM

Interesting, never heard of a limit on people around the stadium. I knew they definitely had regulations about non-sponsored vendors in the immediate area.

saiholmes

February 8th, 2011, 06:11 AM

Ed Roski keeps faith in his stadium plan to bring football back to Los Angeles
Roski, a real estate magnate, says his concept for City of Industry is better than AEG's plan for a stadium near Staples Center. He says he will not back the AEG plan, even after its record-setting naming rights deal with Farmers Insurance.
By Sam Farmer
February 7, 2011
Reporting from Arlington, Texas

Even though his competition in downtown Los Angeles has landed a record-setting deal for naming rights — and the quiet favor of many NFL owners and executives — real estate magnate Ed Roski is far from losing hope on his stadium concept in City of Industry.

Roski still thinks his plan is the best option to bring the NFL back to the L.A. area, and says he has no intention of ever throwing his weight behind the competing project, proposed for a site next to Staples Center.

"No way," he said over breakfast in Dallas, where Sunday he attended the Super Bowl in neighboring Arlington. "Because I don't believe in it. I don't believe that's where it should be. I think we should play football where there's a football place, where we can have an event."

Roski repeatedly stressed his entire focus is bringing football back to L.A., however, and he said would not participate in or fund any lawsuit that would attempt to block a deal downtown, where AEG has proposed replacing the West Hall of the Convention Center with a retractable-roof stadium that would host not only football games, but all types of major events.

"Why would we?" he said when asked if he would sue. "We want to bring football back to Los Angeles. That's all we're working on."

Added John Semcken, Roski's point man on the stadium who also attended the breakfast with a Times reporter: "We have never in almost 70 years as a developer sued another company."

Roski said he has investigated every conceivable site since the late 1990s and has determined the best option is the 600 acres he controls in Industry, both because of the vast area for parking and ancillary development, and because of the site's proximity to Orange County and the Inland Empire.

What's more, the land is fully entitled for a stadium. But Semcken conceded there are only schematics for the venue, not advanced design drawings.

"The only thing we have left to do are construction documents," Semcken said. "So we're all the way through the schematics. So what we would do is while we were grading the site, we'd finish the construction documents."

Tim Leiweke, chief executive of AEG, said the company is working on design drawings to be completed by year's end. Those can cost as much as $10 million or more, and to be done in a timely manner require dozens of architects working full time on the project. The land for the stadium has not been acquired from the city, and a team has not been secured.

"You construct the project with those design drawings," he said. "So without those design drawings, there is no project. You've got to have the design drawings from an architectural firm in order to bid out the project and to get construction. We're going right at it. So that's substantial because of the amount of money it takes to do that.

"If you don't have design drawings, you're a year away. That's reality."

While emphasizing that resolving the labor crisis is by far the top priority, and that there will be no new stadiums until there is a new collective bargaining agreement, several influential NFL owners and executives say they prefer the downtown site, and see its proximity to AEG's L.A. Live as a one-stop-shopping locale for Super Bowls.

"As you sit here during Super Bowl weekend and look at the economic impact on Dallas, it's very clear how well this event would do at L.A. Live," Leiweke said. "It's built to do an event like that. So it's good that everyone's going to focus on bringing football back to L.A."

Whereas Roski watched the Super Bowl from the Cowboys Stadium stands, Leiweke sat in the suite of Cowboys owner Jerry Jones. Leiweke said he "had great conversations with owners over the weekend, and they think Phil [Anschutz] and AEG can pull this off. So game on."

Last week, AEG and Farmers Insurance announced the biggest naming-rights deal in history, a 30-year agreement thought to be worth $700 million. Roski was not overly impressed with that deal.

"Do you really think there's a problem getting naming rights in Los Angeles?" Roski said. "That's simple. That's the easiest part of the deal. Why would you want to do it until you're ready to go? You don't need it. …

"We don't think it's important to do that. We think it's to our advantage to wait. Once you've got something going, the price goes up."

Leiweke said AEG has done more naming-rights deals than anyone in the world, "and I'm fairly certain that the method we employed here is the right method. These things aren't easy to do, just ask New York or Dallas" where the NFL teams play in new stadiums without naming-rights partners.

For the most part, Roski steered clear of criticizing the downtown site, other than saying he doesn't think the location is the right one and lumping it in with Carson, Anaheim and other proposed sites that have come and gone.

For months, Industry backers — including their public-relations people and political lobbyists — have been highly critical of the downtown proposal, sometimes making the remarks personal. In December, Semcken told the Orange County Register that Leiweke is "a bad guy" and called the downtown proposal "a pipe dream in Los Angeles that is confusing people."

In emphasizing that the AEG proposal would require "zero taxpayer dollars," Leiweke in December said Industry backers should "stop scaring the public" and that "everyone sees right through them, including the league."

Several high-ranking people within the NFL, while praising the merits of the Industry proposal, have expressed annoyance that much of the recent effort by its backers have been bashing the downtown concept, rather than touting their own.

"I'm the one who created that image," Semcken said. "It's my fault that we were hammering on that other project. What we were trying to do is to get people to focus on our project, and that was before they announced their project. Now that they've announced it, we don't have to do that anymore. We're just going to talk our project, they're going to talk about their project, and people are going to decide what works."

Roski echoed that.

"I think all this rhetoric just confuses the situation," he said. "We just want to get a team back. I'm just tired of watching it on TV.

"I want to go (to the game."

Read More: http://www.latimes.com/sports/la-sp-la-nfl-20110207,0,7527140.story

Westsidelife

February 8th, 2011, 06:17 AM

Why is Roski/Majestic still fighting a battle they have clearly already lost? Just give it up already...

slipperydog

February 8th, 2011, 06:26 AM

Apparently the design they showed during the presentation (Gensler) may not even be the actual design. Lieweke said it was simply a prototype and they haven't even chosen the architect yet. He also mentioned they want to clad the outside with the same material as Munich's Allianz Arena, which none of the early drawings have. So I would not be surprised if a) Gensler was not the architect, and b) the final design ends up looking vastly different from any of the drawings we've seen thus far

milquetoast

February 8th, 2011, 06:27 AM

When is this design going to be chosen again?

vahebaronian

February 8th, 2011, 08:14 PM

Why is Roski/Majestic still fighting a battle they have clearly already lost? Just give it up already...

I think that Roski and Majestic got a little boost when some politicians came out and said they were not happy that in this time of city budget deficits, to give out a $350 million bond to tear down the convention center.

Roski's argument is I'm ready to build without any money from the city. The land is mine, unlike AEG I dont need to borrow money from a broke city.

Seems like the public (the non hardcore sports fans) is starting to feel this way too.

However, the NFL I heard, privately prefers the Downtown option because how everything is centrally located

GarfieldPark

February 8th, 2011, 08:27 PM

saiholmes

February 9th, 2011, 06:31 AM

Leiweke says taxpayer funds won't be used for NFL stadium in L.A.
'We're going to do the right thing,' the AEG chief tells residents skeptical about financing plans for the $1-billion facility proposed for downtown L.A.
By Patrick J. McDonnell, Los Angeles Times
February 9, 2011

The head of the entertainment conglomerate seeking to build a National Football League stadium in downtown Los Angeles shot back at skeptics Tuesday and reiterated his pledge that "not a penny" of taxpayer money would be spent on the mega-project.

"The city's never going to have to pay a penny — and we're going to guarantee it," said Timothy J. Leiweke, president and chief executive officer of Anschutz Entertainment Group, which is behind the $1-billion stadium plan.

"It's easy to take shots at this," said Leiweke, who seemed taken aback at public apprehension that taxpayers could be left footing the bill — despite AEG's vows to the contrary. "Will everyone just take a deep breath and have a little faith that we're not going to lie to people? We're going to do the right thing. Calm down....There's no tricks. There's no risks."

City Councilman Paul Krekorian, who has urged caution on the stadium plan, said Tuesday that detailed studies on the fiscal, environmental and traffic ramifications of the stadium proposal were needed.

"I appreciate [Leiweke's] continuing clear commitment that this proposal will not cost a penny to taxpayers," Krekorian said. "But I, as a member of the City Council, need to analyze this beyond the developer's commitment."

A formal stadium proposal should be presented this week, Leiweke told reporters after a news conference meant to drum up support for a proposed streetcar line downtown. But questions afterward focused not on the streetcar but on the stadium deal that has already been embraced by Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa and others.

The issue of public subsidies for corporate-owned stadiums and arenas has been a source of contentious debate nationwide for years. Policy-makers have to weigh the projected benefits — such as expanded business, tourism and tax revenues — against the costs to taxpayers.

Several council members have already voiced reservations at a time when the city is facing a fiscal crisis that could result in additional layoffs, furloughs and service cuts. As part of the stadium deal, the city would lease land to AEG and issue $350 million in bonds for a renovation of the adjacent convention center. Leiweke vowed to make up any financing gap if revenue from the stadium and a rebuilt convention center fall short.

"When the proposal gets there, everyone's going to take a deep breath and realize: There is zero risk to the taxpayer," Leiweke said. "This is people trying to scare people. And it's a shame."

The project, Leiweke said, would be a boost for the beleaguered construction industry, where, he said, unemployment has reached 30%. "And if people think that's going to be solved by sitting here and throwing rocks," he said, "they're wrong."

While Los Angeles still lacks a football franchise, Leiweke said the NFL has reacted enthusiastically to the stadium proposal. "They love L.A.," he said of the league. "They want us to get this done."

According to the AEG executive, the L.A. project would be the largest private stadium investment in league history.

"Almost every other community in the world would be throwing parades," Leiweke said.

The AEG chief 's comments followed release of a new study estimating that construction of a streetcar line in downtown Los Angeles would generate 9,300 jobs, $1.1 billion in development and $24.5 million in additional annual tourism and consumer spending.

Business and civic leaders are backing the proposed 4-mile street car loop, which would connect the Bunker Hill arts and finance district to Staples Center, the convention center and the proposed new NFL stadium.

The $125-million street-car project — a throwback to the transit lines that crisscrossed the city before the advent of the freeways — would be built with federal and local funds, backers say, including a new tax assessment on downtown property owners, including AEG, which owns Staples Center and the adjacent L.A. Live entertainment complex . AEG backs the street-car idea and the tax, said Leiweke, who raised the novel prospect of a Super Bowl in Los Angeles with much of the crowd arriving via mass transit.

"It's ironic," Leiweke said of the street-car plan, "that we want to go back to something that was the mainstay 70 years ago."

Read More: http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-stadium-20110209,0,3025979.story

future_trance011

February 9th, 2011, 10:00 AM

For what its worth --- as a person who is not from California, I would MUCH rather see the stadium built in downtown LA. It would be great to go to an event there and have all of the other interesting things to do nearby. Going to something in the City of Industry would not be my idea of an interesting place to go. I'd like to be able to go to an event and have many options of places to walk to nearby or reach different places by taking a ride a short distance in a cab or on local public transit. I'm not that familiar with the City of Industry -- but it sounds like it is a good distance from the heart of LA and the other interesting things in and near central LA. I don't want to go to a stadium that is surrounded by parking lots.

The City of Industry is roughly 25 miles from DTLA. There's really nothing worth seeing in there, unless strip clubs and a bunch of warehouses is your thing.

My friend who is a big NFL fan and lives in Fullerton, which is only a short 10-15 minute drive on the 57 Freeway from Majectic's/Ed Roski's proposed site, doesn't even want it there. He lives a good distance from the heart of LA, yet prefers the DT location. Why? Because he cites LA needing a multi-purpose facility like the one proposed in DT, not a facility that gets used 8 or 9 times out of the year. Which is pretty wasteful of resources and encourages sprawl.

The DTLA stadium proposal is head and shoulders above the COI proposal, which is why we all have to get behind it. Not only cos of the jobs, tax revenue, and ripple effect to downtown/local businesses that will be generated... but also to improve the fan experience for tourists such as yourself in the (hopefully), not too distant future because of the more centralized location -- Imagine getting on a subway/light rail train and going to Hollywood, Old Pasadena (or even Santa Monica someday), after an event at the downtown location, leaving the hassle of driving/being stuck in traffic that one would indefinitely encounter in the COI location, due to the sub-par infrastructure there. That's not to say that there won't be traffic in and around downtown itself, but at least people will have options. Plus there will be many hotels in downtown within walking distance from that stadium and if you elect to stay in downtown? You could just walk. Can you believe it? Walking in LA? What a contrarian concept! Well it'll be happening a lot more with projects like these that centralize things and make it easier for all of us residents (and even visitors such as yourself).

The emphasis on "options" that the DTLA proposal offers as an Events Center/prime destination in a centralized location, will speak for itself and is ultimately (in my opinion), what makes it the more attractive and most logical proposal for the City of Angels.

LosAngelesSportsFan

February 10th, 2011, 09:43 AM

Im honestly tired of the Traffic naysayers. Remember a few years ago, we had the Super LA Sports Day. all of these happened at the same time and it wasnt that bad..

USC at Colosieum - 92,000
UCLA at Rose Bowl - 65,000
Dodgers at Dodger Stadium - 56,000
Kings at Staples Center - 18,000

and i believe there was a convention as well.

klamedia

February 10th, 2011, 06:35 PM

According to you posters that were here during Staples construction this song and dance about traffic and public money being used is nothing new. On top of that Staples at the time had to contend with the blighted image of Dwntwn LA which has seen a significant turnaround. The positive streetcar findings comes at the perfect time for AEG, I believe this thing will be built.

pesto

February 11th, 2011, 06:47 PM

Although I'm not the biggest fan of a DT stadium, no doubt the streetcar would be a great complement to it and would allow thousands to eat at, say, Jtown, Gr. Cent. Mkt. or Cliftons without substantial walks. But I suppose most would hit closer sports bars.

Franchise646

February 18th, 2011, 02:24 AM

A copy of the proposal for Farmers Field.

http://www.thecitymaven.com/2011/02/17/aeg-submits-proposal-for-farmers-field/

http://la.curbed.com/archives/2011/02/developer_aeg_has_just_submitted.php

http://blogdowntown.com/2011/02/6126-aeg-submits-stadium-proposal-briefs-mayors

Bullet points

1. AEG will build parking garages for 4,000 parking spaces located West of the event center. Another 1,400 spaces are planned, too. The parking garages are estimated to cost $80 million to build.
2. New parking garages will be owned by the city but operated by AEG, which will pass on a percentage of profits to city.
3. Developer gets signage rights for all the new projects; developer or its affiliate will pay city for signage rights.
4. Deal will be modeled after Staples.
5. The new convention hall is estimated to cost $220 million to build.
6. The Event Center will accommodate a wide variety of uses, including NFL football, soccer, conventions, exhibitions, trade shows, concerts, sporting events, and more.

CITYofDREAMS

February 19th, 2011, 05:06 AM

Interesting article from LA Times

NFL stadium deal could be a tricky call for Los Angeles
A cash-strapped Los Angeles could be bargaining partly in the dark with Denver billionaire Phil Anschutz's AEG, which is privately held. Most of how the conglomerate performs financially is kept secret.
http://www.latimes.com/media/photo/2011-02/59548733.jpg

With Los Angeles facing sharply reduced city income, service cuts and the prospect of layoffs of municipal workers, some officials are eyeing the proposed $1-billion downtown football stadium as a potential source of new money for the cash-strapped treasury.

But city negotiators could be bargaining partly in the dark with Denver billionaire Phil Anschutz's lieutenants. Anschutz's sports conglomerate, AEG, which is proposing to build the stadium on city-owned land, is privately held. Most of how it performs financially — such as how much it makes on existing projects like Staples Center — is kept secret.

Backers of the stadium say it would pay huge dividends in jobs and new economic activity, all at no cost to taxpayers. Others are more skeptical and say the city should wring as much income as possible out of a financing agreement to be negotiated in the coming weeks.

Get the monthly that has L.A. talking. Subscribe to Los Angeles Times Magazine at a special introductory rate.

"If we go forward with the stadium there, we should participate in the profits. Period," said Westside City Councilman Bill Rosendahl. "We need to put on our own business hat as a city." Los Angeles should share in the financial benefits of the stadium, he said, since it already has provided financial help to revitalize that part of downtown, including AEG's Staples Center and the L.A. Live entertainment complex.

AEG wants a quick stadium deal from City Hall, although the company has not yet explained what financial information it will provide to the city.

While stressing that the proposed National Football League stadium would be funded entirely with private money, AEG wants to lease a prime piece of public land near Staples. It also hopes to open up space for its 64,000-seat stadium by tearing down and relocating a wing of the Los Angeles Convention Center. And AEG wants the city to borrow roughly $350 million to pay for that reconstruction.

Ground rent and new sales, ticket and property tax revenue from the completed project would help repay the loan, although AEG point man Timothy J. Leiweke acknowledges it would probably fall $6 million to $8 million a year short of the amount needed to repay the bond. But he promises the company will cover that gap so "not a penny" will come from city coffers.

What isn't clear is how much AEG anticipates profiting off the stadium and the increased business that would flow to its adjacent 1,001 hotel rooms and entertainment holdings. The project would bring in money not just from sporting and concert events, but also from an increased number of large conventions that AEG believes would be drawn to the stadium.

AEG made its first formal presentation Thursday to Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa's blue-ribbon panel charged with reviewing the proposal, and closed-door negotiations with the city's top financial analysts are expected in the coming days.

Councilman Paul Krekorian, who represents the San Fernando Valley, said one aspect of the project that needed particular scrutiny is the ground lease. He said city negotiators need to go in with an eye toward squeezing new revenue out of the deal and weighing other development options. "The way you do that is by having full knowledge of what the deal is and be willing to walk away from it," he said.

Chief Legislative Analyst Gerry Miller, who is heading the city's negotiating team, said he did not know what sort of information would be requested from AEG. But ensuring that no city money is spent on the proposal, that it is financially viable and that the city bonds can be repaid will be the main focus. "The economics of the development of the stadium and projections of ticket prices, all of those sorts of issues are going to have to be looked at," Miller said.

AEG's lack of transparency may make it hard for the public and city officials to know how much money — if any — might be left on the negotiating table and whether they would be passing up chances to generate cash that could help save municipal services being slashed because of the city's ongoing financial crisis.

So far, the company has declined to release its reported $700-million, 30-year naming rights deal with Farmers Insurance, which has been held up as a financial linchpin of the deal.

In a statement, AEG said "the nature and magnitude of this project and the public commitments it entails warrant a very careful and deliberate evaluation by the City." It pledged to "fully cooperate with elected officials, City staff and their appointed advisors and representatives."

The talks between AEG and the city will focus in large part on how much of the new tax revenue from the project area would go toward repaying the Convention Center bonds. That will help determine how much AEG has to put in over the next 30 years to fulfill its pledge to use no public money.

One point of contention may be the $2 million to $3 million in new property taxes generated by the stadium improvements themselves. Leiweke told The Times that AEG wants that to go toward paying off the debt. But he said the city probably won't agree to divert all of it.

"I just negotiated against myself there," he quickly added.

To drive as hard a bargain as possible, city officials need all the financial information they can get on revenue and profit projections, says author Neil deMause, who has studied the economics of sports arenas for 16 years and has often been skeptical of such deals. The city needs to use its power to approve the project, and its borrowing ability, to get that data from AEG, he said.

"You need to understand the finances [and] make sure the split for the costs and the split for the revenues are fairly equitable," he said. "They can at the very least use [their] leverage to demand information."

AEG also wants to be in charge of rebuilding the Convention Center's West Hall and parking facilities. It is proposing to include tens of millions of dollars in construction contingency funds in the $350 million that the city would borrow. The firm also hopes to take over Convention Center operations from the city.

The company and several key city officials, including the mayor, have framed the stadium negotiations as a win for the city: It gets a stadium and a much more competitive Convention Center at no taxpayer cost.

The city's top budget analyst, Miguel Santana, said the city deserves credit for holding out for a cost-free stadium plan when many cities across the country have heavily subsidized NFL arenas. "There's a reason we haven't had football as long as we haven't had it," he said.

Austin Beutner, Villaraigosa's jobs czar and head of the panel reviewing the deal, said he agreed the city needs to drive a hard bargain. But some elements of the proposal must be viewed in light of the $1-billion investment Anschutz is making, the tens of thousands of jobs being promised and the increased economic activity the project could spur, he said.

"I think it's more than fair that they earn a return on that investment," he said after Thursday's session with AEG officials. As for what rate of return is projected to be, he said, "I don't know that that's necessarily relevant to this exercise."

AEG says there will be broad payoffs for the city in new employment and hundreds of millions of dollars in new economic activity generated by the stadium, the upgraded Convention Center and possible new hotels nearby. And Leiweke stressed that AEG is taking a big gamble.

The stadium/convention proposal is "the most difficult project I've ever done with Mr. Anschutz," he said. "This is a gutsy, gutsy move on our part to make the $1 billion [stadium investment] work."

City officials and business backers of the proposal point to AEG's success in developing Staples Center and the L.A. Live entertainment district with city assistance. The most recent public analysis of Staples Center in 2003, before L.A. Live opened, found the city was receiving $3.85 million a year in net new revenue, and the arena was generating about $35 million a year in new taxable sales.

"We know what they're capable of doing. We have a track record on which to measure them now," Councilwoman Jan Perry, who represents downtown and parts of South L.A., said of AEG.

However, the city report echoed the caution of some experts that promises of broad increased economic activity from such projects can be tricky to measure and hidden costs can accompany new development.

Los Angeles officials should tread carefully with AEG, said Dennis Coates, a University of Maryland-Baltimore County professor of economics who has written on the costs of stadiums to local governments. "Just because it's the government doesn't mean they shouldn't be thinking, 'What are the alternative uses?…What is the real value of using that land?'

"Government should be very dubious of companies coming and saying, 'We're going to give you all this stuff and it won't cost you a penny.'"

rich.connell@latimes.com

seema.mehta@latimes.com

david.zahniser@latimes.com

Times staff writer Jessica Garrison contributed to this report.
Copyright © 2011, Los Angeles Times

klamedia

February 19th, 2011, 08:27 PM

The city's top budget analyst, Miguel Santana, said the city deserves credit for holding out for a cost-free stadium plan when many cities across the country have heavily subsidized NFL arenas. "There's a reason we haven't had football as long as we haven't had it," he said.

See, I thought along the same lines a Miguel that LA hasn't had an NFL team and therefore no stadium built (or the other way around) because the city has balked at the idea of putting up tax payer money to build one. So unlike San Diego, St. Louis, SF and NY we have now waited around until someone has said we'll foot the bill and even expand your convention space but "we want what is ours", so we have acted prudently for almost 20 years. AEG is a bigtime corporation, they're not about losing money but they have taken some pretty "gustsy" chances in LA when
common sense would have said not to. It's just interesting that the naysayers who rail against the stadium have no clear plan on how to continue to revitalize downtown LA or enhance and compliment our growing rail mass transit system that largely converges on the area. I say give AEG the run of it, I mean these are the same people who built Staples when the only people dowtown after dark were pushing shopping carts.

losangelino

February 27th, 2011, 06:22 AM

I'm really loving this... I see a third Olympic Games in LA.

I love this. PERFECT!

saiholmes

March 5th, 2011, 02:53 AM

Proposed NFL stadium changes its name to 'Grand Crossing'
March 3, 2011 | 2:19 pm

It turns out the NFL isn't a big fan of Industry -- at least the name, anyway.

At the request of the NFL, planners of a proposed football stadium are no longer using the City of Industry when referring to the location of their 75,000-seat venue. The $800-million project is now being referred to as "Grand Crossing," said John Semcken, vice president of developer Majestic Realty Co.

“I was specifically asked if I could change the name of the city by the National Football League, and I said yes and I did it,” Semcken told the Associated Press. “It's an impression that they have, which was a negative impression, and there's no reason to have it. You just get rid of it.”

The name change may be an effort by the NFL and the developer to give the stadium a better image. Semcken says the City of Industry had no objections to the name change. NFL spokesman Brian McCarthy declined to comment on the name change when contacted by the Associated Press.

Grand Crossing is one of two proposed NFL stadiums vying to bring the NFL back to Los Angeles. Earlier this year, AEG announced a rival plan to build the 64,000-seat Farmers Field on the site of the Los Angeles Convention Center.

-- Austin Knoblauch

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

Read More: http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/sports_blog/2011/03/proposed-nfl-stadium-changes-its-name-to-grand-crossing.html

pesto

March 5th, 2011, 06:14 PM

A little reality check: marketing and image counts more than environmental friendliness, traffic, livability concerns, rational financing, messing up your neighbors or who moves there. I'm not saying Industry or DT was better either way in these terms: I'm saying they don't actually count for much with the NFL.

Maybe the Raiders would still be in town if Irwindale had changed its name to Raidertown or maybe Davisville.

klamedia

March 5th, 2011, 06:46 PM

Grand Crossing? How fucking original. The LA Live stadium proposal is looking more and more like Beyonce. While the Industry, ehemm Grand Crossing stadium is looking like Katy Perry.

CITYofDREAMS

March 5th, 2011, 10:43 PM

Grand Crossing? How fucking original. The LA Live stadium proposal is looking more and more like Beyonce. While the Industry, ehemm Grand Crossing stadium is looking like Katy Perry.

:lol:...

saiholmes

March 17th, 2011, 07:35 AM

AEG starts process for environmental review
OK for downtown stadium site may take up to a year
Rick Orlov, Staff Writer
CONTRA COSTA TIMES
Posted: 03/12/2011 11:00:48 PM PST
Updated: 03/13/2011 12:11:33 AM PST

Developer AEG launched the process last week for an environmental review of its plan for a downtown stadium complex, which it hopes will lure a professional football team back to Los Angeles.

In the letter sent to Planning Director Michael LoGrande, a representative for AEG said the company will submit a "notice of preparation" for its environmental impact statement. The notice will be published Thursday, with a scoping meeting set for March 30 to establish the boundaries of the study.

The proposed stadium downtown has stolen some of the buzz in recent months from a stadium planned for the Diamond Bar and Industry border. Billionaire developer Ed Roski and Majestic Realty have been working on bringing the stadium to the edge of the Inland Valley for the past several years.

"The letter clearly and formally states AEG's plans to begin the procedure of producing a complete environmental impact report as part of the process to develop the L.A. Event Center and Farmers Field," AEG spokesman Michael Roth said.

"The issuances of this letter is clearly an important milestone for us and furthering the creation of an NFL stadium."

Roth said AEG plans to exceed the minimum requirements by gathering public comment at hearings around the Los Angeles.

"AEG is committed to working with the city to provide thorough and timely information and analysis," Roth said, adding the same consultants who helped AEG develop Staples Center and L.A. Live will be working on the stadium project.

The letter, from attorney Bill Delvac to LoGrande, said the developers expect traffic and parking to be the most contentious issues.

Anschutz Entertainment Group announced late last year that it wanted to raze the West Hall of the Convention Center and use the site to build a privately financed, $1 billion stadium complex that could be home to one or two pro football teams. The West Hall would be rebuilt in a different location using $350 million in bonds taken out by the city, but repaid by AEG, according to the plan.

AEG executives say they are negotiating for a team with the National Football League, which is considering a rival bid by Majestic Realty.

With AEG pushing forward with its environmental report, Los Angeles officials are working on a separate track to gather public comment about the plan.

A blue-ribbon committee appointed by Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa met briefly last Monday to discuss the potential for job creation from the stadium. No critics attended the meeting, and AEG was praised for its record in training and hiring workers.

Deputy Mayor Austin Beutner, who co-chairs the panel, predicted the EIR process could take up to a year.

"What is key is getting all the questions and concerns of the community answered, and that's what we're attempting to do," Beutner said. "We are posing the questions on whether their (AEG's) assumptions are real, and we will want real answers from them.

"For instance, they have talked about their studies on the jobs to be created. We want to see those studies. If nothing else, it will give stakeholders something to look at to see if it makes sense."

The City Council has created a working group of its staff to negotiate details of the project. The council also plans to form an ad hoc committee of council members to oversee a public review of the deal.

Councilman Paul Krekorian, who has raised questions about the AEG plan, promised to scrutinize the environmental report.

"A project of this magnitude requires a very through analysis of its impacts," Krekorian said. "I'm going to maintain a healthy skepticism about this proposal until that kind of analysis is done."

Read More: http://www.contracostatimes.com/california/ci_17604827?nclick_check=1

milquetoast

March 17th, 2011, 07:47 AM

Well you can kiss that Superbowl anniversary goodbye! (over a fucking year ..)

milquetoast

March 17th, 2011, 09:17 AM

"HONEY, LET'S TAKE THE KIDS AND GO VISIT THE DOROTHY CHANDLER PAVILION" . ATTRACTING MORE CONVENTIONS WOULD BE KEY TO SUCCESS OF DOWNTOWN FOOTBALL STADIUM PROJECT http://i231.photobucket.com/albums/ee192/trolltoast/album%203/LALIve_Evo_Roof_248Final.jpg . An NFL franchise is the central focus of AEG's plan but it's unclear that the stadium would bring in all the conventions and hotel building that AEG envisions. . For Los Angeles' proposed downtown football stadium to succeed as envisioned, its promoters need to attract more than an NFL franchise like the San Diego Chargers. They need to win over teams like David Glanzer's.

Glanzer is part of a crew that scouted — and passed on — Los Angeles as a new venue for Comic-Con International, the comic book, film and pop culture convention that draws more than 100,000 people and $60 million to San Diego each year.

Football is the public focus of a bid by Anschutz Entertainment Group to add a downtown stadium to its portfolio of arena, hotel and theater venues adjoining the Los Angeles Convention Center. But the massive project, using public land, also rests heavily on a hope that a simultaneous overhaul and expansion of the center itself will lift the city into the top ranks of the nation's conference destinations.

"What's driving this vision is the Convention Center.... It doesn't work right," said Timothy J. Leiweke, the AEG chief pushing the stadium deal.

Some convention experts and Los Angeles tourism officials are optimistic that AEG's plan to move a wing of the Convention Center to create room for the stadium would make Los Angeles more attractive to event planners. But others said the project would have to overcome a number of substantial hurdles.

It remains unclear whether the stadium proposal would be profitable without a big increase in convention business. Citing pending City Hall negotiations, AEG personnel declined to discuss it with The Times.

As city officials begin weighing the fine points of the $1.35-billion proposal, attention is focusing on three interlocking elements: AEG's upbeat assumption about its ability to attract major new convention business; whether the project can trigger construction of thousands of close-by convention hotel rooms; and the financial backup to AEG's pledge that taxpayers will not be on the hook if the whole plan goes bad.

Leiweke's pitch is that reworking the Convention Center and integrating the new stadium into the operation could double the number of conventions lured to the city, adding an average of more than one new event per month.

However, AEG and convention officials set a less ambitious goal last week, telling a city panel they hope to add four to six new conventions a year. The key will be getting the right type of events, an AEG spokesman said, noting that about one-third of the Convention Center's yearly revenue now comes from just two gatherings.

Project backers said they expect more conventions to stimulate construction of hundreds — perhaps thousands — of hotel rooms within walking distance of the Convention Center. "We are at a competitive disadvantage. We drastically need more hotel rooms downtown," said Mark Liberman, president of LA Inc., the Los Angeles Convention and Visitors Bureau. He noted that Anaheim, San Diego and San Francisco have three to six times as many hotel rooms immediately around their convention centers.

New economic activity would generate taxes from the project area that would help pay off $350 million the city would borrow to move the Convention Center's West Hall, replace parking and clear space for the privately financed stadium. AEG has promised to cover any shortfall in city repayments and says the public will benefit from tens of thousands of new jobs and hundreds of millions of dollars in new spending.

Such a multi-faceted concept could work, according to some experts, developers and convention industry officials. AEG's recent opening of two hotels at nearby L.A. Live already has helped, drawing new conventions, one of which is this summer's Microsoft Worldwide Partner Conference with 15,000 attendees.

But others warn that luring the most lucrative business gatherings away from other highly competitive cities could be a tall order.

Comic-Con's reasons for staying in San Diego touch on many of the obstacles Los Angeles faces — too few hotels in downtown and a lack of contiguous exhibition space — as well as San Diego's hard work in retaining the massive gathering.

Comic-Con is not the only group reluctant to move. "Our members have told us they like the campus feel of the Anaheim Convention Center," said Scott Robertson, marketing director for NAMM, formerly the National Assn. of Music Merchants, whose convention is among the top 25 in the world and draws some 90,000 attendees.

The most coveted large conventions, such as medical groups, often rotate around the country and may return to a venue only every three to five years, said Steven Spickard, a sports and event center consultant for 30 years who has advised Los Angeles and other large cities. To get the 16 new conventions a year Leiweke has suggested, the center might need to land 45 to 60 major conventions on a recurring but not annual basis, he said.

Although that is possible, Los Angeles would need to win over "a whole bunch of them," he said. "And all the other places that have had them in the past are still competing."

Liberman, L.A.'s convention marketing chief, has said the city could draw more than six new conventions annually, but he cautioned that there is "absolutely no guarantee" even that goal will be reached.

Most experts and city officials interviewed by The Times agree that moving the West Hall of the Convention Center and connecting its exhibition space directly to the large South Hall would improve the marketability of the facility.

. Together, the halls have 770,000 square feet of exhibition space, making Los Angeles about 15th in the nation. The proposed retractable-roof stadium would increase the useable convention space to about 1.2 million square feet. But AEG acknowledges that in terms of flat, open exhibition space — the kind many exhibitors prefer — it would add only about 165,000 square feet on the stadium floor. That means Los Angeles still would not be among the top 10 cities in the nation, based on industry rankings.

"In the great scheme of space, it's not very much," said Heywood Sanders, a professor at the University of Texas at San Antonio and author of several critical convention center studies. "And it doesn't work out particularly well. It's not … particularly functional space to be on the [stadium floor] with a vast roof and lots of empty seats."

Two convention centers that use football stadiums for extra space — Indianapolis and Atlanta — illustrate the challenges AEG and Los Angeles could face.

Indianapolis' Lucas Oil Stadium added 183,000 square feet of exhibition space to its convention center's 566,000 square feet of floor space. But the stadium is off limits during about 47 training and game days during the Indianapolis Colts' season, according to Chris Gahl, a spokesman for the Indianapolis Convention & Visitors Assn. AEG says it expects to limit such disruptions with a separate practice facility.

The Atlanta Falcons' Georgia Dome added 102,000 square feet of exhibition space to its sprawling convention display areas, already the nation's fourth largest. But it is rarely used for such gatherings, because convention planners prefer the contiguous space next door at the Georgia World Congress Center, said Jason Kirksey, a Georgia Dome spokesman.

Los Angeles officials say the stadium would open the door for the largest gatherings, including major religious groups, which bring tens of thousands of attendees together for opening and closing ceremonies. And without the stadium project, they say, the city would have no money to fund costly Convention Center improvements needed to retain even existing conventions.

Leiweke and key downtown business leaders say a redone convention campus would drive development of new hotels, a long-time city goal thwarted by market conditions and difficulties getting financing.

But hotels survive on a balance of conventions, business travelers and tourists, which poses challenges in downtown Los Angeles, said Carl Winston, director of the hospitality and tourism management school at San Diego State. "Most tourists, when they think of L.A., don't think of staying downtown. They want to be by the beach, they want to be in West L.A., they want to be in Anaheim. It's not, 'Honey, let's take the kids and go visit the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion.'"

A stadium would make downtown a more vibrant hotel market, said James Butler, chairman of the global hospitality group at Jeffer, Mangel, Butler & Marmaro, a Century City law firm. "But I'm not sure that the market either needs four or five more hotels or that there would be enough business to sustain it."

The most difficult challenge, Leiweke says, will be getting another 1,000-room hotel to help anchor the largest conventions. That would probably require the city to add a financial incentive by reducing its customary bed-tax share, he said.

AEG's recently completed downtown hotels received such a subsidy. But with city services being slashed and with the city's budget shortfall estimated at $404 million, a push for more subsidies could prove controversial. Peter Zen, owner of the Westin Bonaventure, said he would probably fight efforts to give new hotels a tax break.

AEG said it supports a transparent review, but for now its officials declined to answer a number of questions, including whether the stadium would be profitable if increased convention business and construction of new hotels do not materialize as hoped.

The company also declined to describe the financial backup for its guarantee that no taxpayer money would ever be used for the project. It is not clear, for example, whether the assets of AEG or some form of letter of credit, bond or insurance policy would stand behind the pledge.

In a statement, AEG said it is confident that by the end of the approval process, the city and the public "will discover that there are no hidden secrets or agendas" and that the company stands behind its commitment to develop the stadium "at no cost and no risk to the tax payers."SEEMA MEHTAseema.mehta@latimes.com
RICH CONNELL rich.connell@latimes.com LOSANGELESTIMES

vahebaronian

March 25th, 2011, 10:43 PM

http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/designer-selected-1-billion-la-171552

AEG hires architecture firm Gensler to design Farmers Field.

The proposed downtown Los Angeles football stadium now has a designer. Developer AEG announced Friday that it had selected architecture firm Gensler to design Farmers Field, the $1 billion NFL stadium and events center that would be built next to L.A Live and Staples Center.

AEG has already begun drafting an environmental impact report for the project, which is required for city approval, and Gensler plans to complete initial design drawings for the stadium by the first quarter of 2012.

Bringing the NFL back to Los Angeles — which hasn’t had a team since 1995 — won’t be easy. The stadium still needs city approval and likely would require the uprooting of an existing NFL team. The project is also a complicated undertaking, requiring the demolition of part of the Convention Center to make way for the stadium. There’s also a competing proposal for a stadium in the City of Industry.

Sports businessman Casey Wasserman, who is working with AEG on the proposed stadium, recently told The Hollywood Reporter that bringing the NFL back to L.A. “is one of the last unique things to do in the business of sports.” (Link to Wasserman Exec Suite.)

Gensler has previously worked with AEG: the architecture firm designed the 54-story hotel tower that is part of the developer’s L.A. Live mixed-use project.

The Los Angeles-based firm had been competing with architecture firms HKS and HNTB for the commission. Gensler has a team with solid stadium-designing experience. The company’s Ron Turner, who will work on the project, was involved in the design of Philadelphia’s Lincoln Financial Field and Cincinnati’s Paul Brown Stadium.

saiholmes

March 26th, 2011, 04:36 AM

YIKES! HERE'S SOME LARGER VERSIONS. I DON'T KNOW WHAT TO MAKE OF THESE ... . http://i231.photobucket.com/albums/ee192/trolltoast/album%203/Fullscreencapture1229201023618AM.jpg . http://i231.photobucket.com/albums/ee192/trolltoast/album%203/Fullscreencapture1229201023628AM.jpg . I didn't waste my time with the others. This one looks like it would be relevant for about 8 years. Starting right now of course.

So this is the one.

milquetoast

March 26th, 2011, 10:32 AM

Romani said the preference is still to go with a retractable roof but, "We're just going to study both to see what the opportunities and constraints are." . Turner said one possibility that will be considered is a translucent roof made of a material that can change any color when light is shot through it, raising the possibility the stadium could be lit different colors depending on the occasion.
sam.farmer@latimes.com
. This is a very troubling comment. This is the first time we find out that there isn't going to be a retractable roof, and that the roof they use will be translucent plastic, therefore .. a tent!

slipperydog

March 26th, 2011, 10:58 AM

I'm definitely skeptical, but I'd have to see it before I made a final judgment on it. "Permanent translucent roof", huh? Sounds like a fancy way of saying we're gonna build a Georgia Dome that changes colors. In the end though, I think they'll go retractable.

milquetoast

March 26th, 2011, 12:15 PM

Actually ...when you look closer at the design, you can see guide rails for the roof, and at one end it kind of "rolls" up,................ like a fucking fruit roll ...

klamedia

March 27th, 2011, 05:21 PM

Better than a Hot Pocket.

ElDudarinodotcom

March 28th, 2011, 12:36 AM

Actually ...when you look closer at the design, you can see guide rails for the roof, and at one end it kind of "rolls" up,................ like a fucking fruit roll ...

Relax. That's a preliminary design. Chances are the final product will look nothing like this. Although I do like the design, and I think that a retractable roof is necessary. There is no need for a domed stadium in LA.

vahebaronian

April 1st, 2011, 08:09 PM

Some good news..

http://www.thecitymaven.com/2011/03/31/billionaires-battle-to-bring-pro-football-back-to-l-a/

Billionaires Battle to Bring Pro Football Back to L.A.

Stories March 31, 2011 2:29 pm

Representatives of the Anschutz Entertainment Group and Majestic Realty revealed little this morning during a panel discussion on bringing the NFL back to Los Angeles, but moderator Frank Stoltze, a reporter with KPCC radio, let it slip that an AEG rep told him 12 of the 15 members of the Los Angeles City Council are already on board with the project.

That news was somewhat surprising, considering the fact that an environmental impact study has not been completed, the financial details of the plan have not been finalized, and the council’s ad hoc committee on the stadium has yet to meet.

According to Stoltze, the council members who have not committed to the plan are Bill Rosendahl, Paul Krekorian and Paul Koretz.

Los Angeles City Councilwoman Jan Perry joined AEG’s Dan Beckerman, Majestic Realty’s John Semcken and David Pettit with the National Resources Defense Council for the panel discussion hosted by the Pat Brown Institute at the Biltmore Hotel. The two hour-talk on the dueling NFL proposals ranged from environmental impacts, traffic concerns, parking and location.

In AEG’s favor, supporters say the greatest benefit will come from the added Convention Center space that will be built by tearing down the West Hall and replacing it with a building contiguous to the South Hall.

“The project more than anything is a partnership. It’s a partnership with the city, with the NFL, the citizens of Los Angeles, leading environmental organizations and leading business leaders,” Beckerman said. “This needs to be a public-private partnership that works for the city and us, modeled after what has been so successful at Staples Center.”

On the other end of the table, Semcken told the audience that the greatest strength of Majestic’s stadium is its location in the City of Industry, which for people living in the Southland will be more accessible than a stadium in downtown L.A. Unlike Farmers Field which would require the city to float bonds for the Convention Center, the Grand Crossing project will not require funds from the city.

Despite its location, Semcken told the audience that Los Angeles would reap the economic benefits of the stadium. He pointed to Phoenix, Dallas, New York and Miami as cities that have benefited from professional football, even though all of those stadiums are located outside city limits.

“We will have a Super Bowl in Los Angeles and when we do it’s going to create in $600, $700, $800 million in one week and all of that benefit is going to come here from people who don’t live here,” Semcken said.

AEG is owned by billionaire Phil Anschutz. Majestic Realty is owned by billionaire Ed Roski.

saiholmes

May 18th, 2011, 05:29 AM

Join the supporters of Farmers Field
http://www.farmersfield.com/

Magic calls on fans to sign petition for L.A. football stadium
NFL.com Wire Reports
Published: May 17, 2011 at 04:24 p.m.

Sports and entertainment company AEG is reaching for star power in its quest to bring a football team to downtown Los Angeles.

In an email sent to Staples Center ticket purchasers and supporters, former Laker legend Earvin "Magic" Johnson made a plea for fans to sign a petition in support of Farmers Field stadium, which would be constructed over half the existing Los Angeles Convention Center in a rapidly-rejuvenated part of downtown that includes LA Live, an AEG-owned entertainment complex with concert venues, restaurants, a bowling alley, movie theaters and the Staples Center, which has housed the Lakers, the Clippers and hockey's Kings since 1999.

"For sports fans, Farmers Field makes L.A. one of the top sports cities in the world, giving us the stadium we need not only to host a football team, but the Super Bowl, Olympics, NCAA Final Fours and other major events," the statement reads. "And for business folks like me, Farmers Field brings more than 18,000 permanent, good paying jobs to the city -- building our urban communities and bringing pride back to our neighborhoods.

"It's about time that we finally give our city a football team -- and bring "Showtime" back to Los Angeles, not just on the basketball court, but on the football field."

AEG often touts LA Live's role in helping rejuvenate downtown Los Angeles as a preview of the impact its stadium proposal could have when promoting its plan to city residents and officials.

The AEG stadium plan is one of two competing proposals that aim to bring football back to Los Angeles some 15 years after the Rams and Raiders left the nation's second-largest market within months of one another.

AEG has said it would pick up the entire $1 billion construction tab for its stadium. The venue would be constructed over half the existing convention center, which would be rebuilt to attract more conventions. The company's plan calls for the city to issue some $350 million in bonds to finance the demolition and relocation of the contention center hall displaced by the stadium.

AEG officials have said they would ask the city to let AEG use stadium ticket taxes and new venue-related revenue from city-owned parking lots to service the debt on the bonds but would make up an estimated $6-million-to-$8-million shortfall.

Warehouse magnate Ed Roski has permits in place to build a separate 75,000-seat stadium about 15 miles east of Los Angeles, in the city of Industry.

Both camps have said they hope to recruit a team -- and possibly two -- from among those that need a new stadium to maximize revenue but are unable to get one built in their current locations.

The San Diego Chargers, Oakland Raiders, Minnesota Vikings and Jacksonville Jaguars are among the teams often mentioned as possible candidates to play in the proposed venues.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

Read More: http://www.nfl.com/news/story/09000d5d81fe108e/article/magic-calls-on-fans-to-sign-petition-for-la-football-stadium

Kenny

May 19th, 2011, 07:16 PM

Done.

Westsidelife

May 22nd, 2011, 12:48 PM

The Vikings' push to build a new stadium has gained significant momentum in the last few months. Goodell has stated before that he prefers the Vikings stay in Minnesota because it serves a populated region (Minnesota and the Dakotas) of about 7 million. Well, it looks like he's ready to back up his words. The NFL plans on pitching in for the Arden Hills stadium.

Commish pledges funds for Vikings
http://sports.espn.go.com/nfl/news/story?id=6559409

In addition to Arden Hills, there's also a proposal to build a new stadium on the site of the Metrodome.

Minneapolis kicks off $1 billion stadium 'game changer'
http://www.startribune.com/local/minneapolis/121518294.html

...

This is great news! The Rams are yet another step closer to returning to Los Angeles. The Vikings are the only thing that stand in the way. The only other teams that could POSSIBLY move are the Bucs and Panthers. The Bucs have been based in Tampa since 1976, they won the Super Bowl in 2002, and they don't seem to have any stadium issues. Plus, it wouldn't make sense to leave Tampa but stay in Jacksonville. And no way the NFL leaves both markets; Florida needs more than one team. That rules out the Bucs. The Panthers serve the Carolinas, a large and rapidly growing region. They just drafted Cam Newton and they don't need a new stadium. That rules them out. So who does that leave? The Rams!

Reasons why the Rams should move back to LA:

1) The need a new stadium. LA can give Kroenke a brand spanking new $1 billion stadium in a prime location. Even better that he has ties with AEG/Anschutz/Leiweke.
2) It's LA, by far the second largest media market in the US. What owner wouldn't want to double the value of their franchise by tapping into a region of 18 million that's been starved of pro football for 20 years?
3) The Rams have history in LA dating back to 1946, so there is already an established fanbase among the older generations who followed them in the 70's.
4) Kroenke has hinted or stated explicitly (can't remember) that he wants a new stadium; renovations won't please him.
5) Kroenke is a member of the LA Stadium Working Group committee. Uh, let's see. The Vikings aren't moving. The Bucs and Panthers probably aren't. That leaves the Rams. Yeah, the door is wide open. LA is there for the taking. It can be all his. It looks oh-so-tempting, doesn't it?
6) Kroenke owns a home in LA. If this is his second home or a place where he spends a significant amount of time, then it makes even more sense.
7) No division realignment would be needed.
8) It makes too much sense.

Kenny

May 22nd, 2011, 09:27 PM

Then Rams, come on back! lol

My family was Rams fans when I was a kid. (LA Rams that is)

GarfieldPark

May 23rd, 2011, 03:57 AM

Westsidelife

May 23rd, 2011, 07:42 AM

Westsidelife: Where did you ever come up with your list of teams that you think might move to L.A.? The Panthers? They're not leaving Charlotte. The Bucs? Why would a successful team leave a metro area of 4 million people? They're not leaving. The Rams??? They're not leaving St. Louis. They've got a perfectly good domed football stadium in the heart of downtown in a region with a good 3 million people nearby.

Uh, didn't I just logically rule out the Bucs and Panthers? :|

If the Edward Jones Dome is so great, then why does Kroenke want a new stadium?

The cities that had been mentioned the most (as teams that might possibly move to L.A.) were Jacksonville, the Twin Cities and San Diego. With a cocky, obnoxious attitude like you've got -- thinking any team would just love to desert their home city and move to a place like L.A. - is really not winning too many fans from across the rest of the country. L.A. shouldn't have let its other two teams leave twenty years ago. Now you think you can just take another team from somewhere else. I hope the Vikings will stay in Minnesota - where they've been for over 50 years. I also hope the Jaguars will stay in Jacksonville. I suppose Jacksonville and Buffalo may have the toughest time keeping their teams because of their smaller populations. If anyone ends up moving -- I'd kind of like to see it be the San Diego Chargers -- because then its not a team completely deserting its home area -- it would still be staying in southern California.

The Jags' stadium lease makes it difficult for them to move in the near future. Besides, does the NFL want three California teams in the AFC?

Goodell is obviously keen on the Vikings staying in Minnesota.

The Chargers certainly appear to be the frontrunner at this juncture. But since they are an AFC team, that doesn't preclude the Rams from moving. LA is a 2-team market. Aside from the Vikings, there is no other NFC team with stadium issues.

You talk about not wanting a team deserting its home area, yet you seem to forget that the Rams called Los Angeles home for 50 years. Talk about ignorance. :|

ryebreadraz

May 24th, 2011, 05:29 AM

I still think the Vikings are the most likely team to move to LA. What have we really gotten out of this new stadium development? The NFL will kick in a small part, but the state still needs to come up with at least a hundred million, which is unlikely.

saiholmes

June 3rd, 2011, 04:50 AM

AEG wants L.A.'s go-ahead on NFL stadium by July 31
The firm advancing the Farmers Field proposal seeks a memorandum of understanding before City Council's summer break, or project could die.
By Sam Farmer
Los Angeles Times
6:40 PM PDT, June 2, 2011

AEG's Tim Leiweke, spearheading an effort to build an NFL stadium next to Staples Center, said Thursday the project could be scuttled if the city doesn't sign off on the framework of a deal by July 31.

"We will know by July 31, one way or another," Leiweke, the sports and entertainment company's chief executive, told The Times from his office at L.A. Live.

Leiweke wants the city to issue $350 million in municipal bonds to relocate the West Hall of the Convention Center — where the proposed Farmers Field will sit — and has promised those will be paid off by new revenue streams created by the project. Any shortfall in annual bond payments would be paid by AEG, Leiweke said.

"I don't think we're meeting with resistance," he said. "I think it's the reality of taking on the huge challenge of using football as an opportunity to also create a vision that gets this city in the top five in the events/convention business."

Gerry Miller, the city's chief legislative analyst, declined to comment on the status or timing of talks. He is leading the team of staffers negotiating the initial elements of a deal that would be brought back to the City Council.

Although a completed deal with the city would take months, AEG is looking for a so-called memorandum of understanding before the 15-member City Council breaks for the summer on Aug. 1. Such a memorandum would require a simple majority to pass. That would keep the project on track to open for the 2016 NFL season.

It's notable that Leiweke is now pointing to the 2016 season, because that already pushes the project back a year from the original, best-case scenario — one that might have allowed L.A. to play host to the 50th Super Bowl.

While saying he's "optimistic" that the city has approached negotiations in a purposeful way, Leiweke said billionaire Philip Anschutz is prepared to pull the plug if the uncertainty drifts into August, thereby opting not to spend an estimated $45 million over the next year on an environmental impact report, designs for the stadium and replacement hall, and pursuing an NFL team.

"Will we get to the right place? I think so," Leiweke said. "But I'm OK if we get to July 31 and we don't get a deal done, and we move on, and I didn't spend $45 million of Phil's money."

If it reaches that point, Leiweke said, "You begin to acknowledge we gave it our best shot and it didn't work."

Asked about the July 31 deadline, City Councilman Bill Rosendahl said: "That's the first I've heard of it." If AEG wants to sit down and talk about the timing of such an agreement, "we're all ears," he said.

"I don't work under threats or pressure or those types of situations," Rosendahl said. "I truly know that AEG has a lot to gain downtown in having a continued successful partnership with the city of Los Angeles."

It is unclear whether the date is a hard deadline or part of a negotiating tactic. Leiweke in the past was willing to walk away from an NFL stadium project. In 2002 AEG took off the table a proposal for an NFL stadium near Staples Center when met with resistance from the Los Angeles Coliseum Commission. This time, however, AEG is more invested in the project in large part because of its proximity to L.A. Live and a tower full of unsold condominiums.

Leiweke said reaching a deal with the city will be more difficult than striking an agreement with the NFL or a team looking to relocate.

"Can this city and these 15 council people figure out a way to get this project done? Huge question mark," Leiweke said. "This is not a city where a lot of new projects get done.

"These 15 folks sometimes don't know how to get out of their own way. Can they kill this deal? Yes, they are very capable of killing this deal.

"The key to this entire vision is going to be a deal with the city."

Read More: http://www.latimes.com/sports/la-sp-la-nfl-stadium-20110603,0,4719881,print.story

saiholmes

June 4th, 2011, 05:29 AM

AEG chief: Problems with NFL stadium deal in L.A. stem from years of mistrust
Tim Leiweke says NFL owners and L.A. officials 'don't have a lot of faith' in one another.
By Sam Farmer
Los Angeles Times
4:40 PM PDT, June 3, 2011

AEG's Tim Leiweke said a big part of the problem in persuading Los Angeles to make a deal for a new football stadium is the rampant mistrust between the city and the NFL — largely created by so many false starts on stadium concepts.

Leiweke said NFL owners "don't have a lot of faith" in L.A., and L.A. "doesn't have faith in the NFL, either."

"There's a lot of distrust there," Leiweke, AEG's chief executive, told The Times this week.

In an hourlong interview, during which he said he set a July 31 deadline for the City Council to approve the framework of a downtown stadium deal, Leiweke touched on a number of topics, among them the deal itself, the challenge of securing a team and whether there's even substantial interest from the public in bringing a team back to the nation's second-largest market.

Calling the downtown concept "the best deal that's ever been made for any city in the history of the NFL," he said the proposal is largely misunderstood.

"The biggest thing people don't understand about the deal is they're all convinced that the $350 million in bonds is going to end up coming back to haunt the city or ultimately affect the general fund, or become a liability to the taxpayers," he said.

"Once people understand the way we're going to structure the bonds, and the fact that we're going to come in and write a check every year to back those bonds, then the only issue in that area is what if you go bankrupt? And we say, please, if we go bankrupt, then you have a far bigger issue than a football stadium or bonds. You've got a $3-billion project and a $6-billion company that goes away? That's not going to happen."

Leiweke said persuading a franchise to relocate — while allowing AEG billionaire Philip Anschutz to become a part-owner — is simpler than striking a deal with the city.

"There are 32 teams, and six or seven of those currently don't have a home that economically works," Leiweke said. "Are all six or seven of those going to solve their problems in their current marketplace? No. We're confident that it's not just going to be one team. I think there are going to be at least two, probably more, that are going to have to look at moving in order to remain competitive within the league."

Asked if he thinks football fans in L.A. are clamoring for a team of their own — something that isn't readily apparent — Leiweke said he has no doubts about the ability of L.A. to support either one or two teams, both in terms of selling tickets and getting sufficient corporate sponsorship to make the venture a success.

"Actually, the one thing we're most certain of," he said, "whether it be naming rights, founding partners, broadcast partners or people that want to buy tickets, there's not a thing we're doing as a company where the first conversation isn't football."

Read More: http://www.latimes.com/sports/la-sp-0604-la-nfl-stadium-20110604,0,1865951.story

saiholmes

June 11th, 2011, 04:15 AM

AEG touts plan for NFL team in L.A.
By SCOTT M. REID
Orange County Register
2011-06-09 22:03:55

LOS ANGELES – Billionaire Philip Anschutz is prepared to acquire majority ownership in an NFL franchise in order to bring a team to Farmers Field, the downtown stadium proposed by the Anschutz Entertainment Group, AEG president Tim Leiweke told the Orange County Register on Thursday night.

Leiweke, in confirming for the first time Anschutz's interest in purchasing a majority share of a team to return the NFL to Southern California after a nearly 16-year absence, Leiweke also said he has spoken with officials from five NFL franchises: Minnesota, San Diego, Oakland, St. Louis and Jacksonville.

Leiweke said he last spoke with an NFL team "a week ago." That team is believed to be Minnesota. The Vikings are pursuing a $1.05 billion stadium proposal in which Ramsey County and the state of Minnesota would pick up $650 million of the tab.

"St. Louis, Jacksonville, not extensively, certainly Oakland, San Diego, Minnesota are still in the mix," Leiweke said listing the teams AEG has met with before adding: "We're not packing any (moving) vans right now."

Leiweke also said AEG is prepared to pay the cost of for an NFL franchise to get out of a current lease so as to relocate to Los Angeles.

"Just as an example, if it's San Diego, they would have to pay $24 million under their agreement to get out of the lease," Leiweke said. "We would pay that."

Leiweke, speaking earlier Thursday to a community group in Pacific Palisades, said the $1.35 billion Farmers Field and Los Angeles Convention renovation project would create $45 million annually in new taxes, according to early data from an economic report prepared for AEG that will be released next week.

That $45 million will be generated by new hotel bed, property, employee and sales taxes that would go directly to the City of Los Angeles' general fund.

AEG and Los Angeles officials are negotiating a ground lease for Farmers Field in the millions annually that will help cover shortfalls in the repayment of $350-million in public bonds for the renovation of the convention center's West Hall.

Debt service for the bonds is estimated at $25 million annually over a 30-year period. AEG has proposed a seat tax on events at Farmers Field to help cover debt service on the bonds.

AEG has acknowledged in the initial years of the bonds there would be an estimated $6 million to $8 million annual shortfall between the debt service and revenues created to pay off the bonds. Leiweke said Thursday AEG would write a check to cover any remaining shortfall.

Leiweke confirmed that AEG has been working on an environmental impact report (EIR) for eight months and hopes to have the report completed by May 31, 2012.

He reiterated AEG's July 31 deadline for reaching a memorandum of understanding with the Los Angeles City Council in order for AEG to move forward with the project. The council is expected to adjourn for the summer between July 31 and Aug.15. AEG hopes to have a deal finalized with the city by May 2012.

Leiweke said the MOU is vital if AEG is to break ground on the project next June, which would enable it to open the stadium in September 2016.

"If it (the council) goes away for the summer without the MOU we've got to rekindle this again in mid-September and we're not going to make 2016," Leiweke said. "If we get the MOU by July 31st, what it proves to the NFL is that we could in fact get a deal done here."

Read More: http://www.ocregister.com/sports/aeg-303920-leiweke-million.html

Westsidelife

June 12th, 2011, 11:45 AM

I think the City Council will give AEG the nod for Farmers Field. I can't help but think they don't want to make the same mistake again. And having a long-term naming rights deal in place is huge.

As for those five NFL franchises, it's clear that the team that moves to LA will be one of those five. The 49ers and Bills were once in the discussion long ago for no apparent reason. Why would the 49ers, a Bay Area team and one of the most storied franchises in all of sports, ever move to LA? That makes no sense. The Bills? Not happening. New York has way too much pride to ever let something like that happen. The Panthers had been mentioned a few times, but they never seemed like they were a serious candidate for relocation. Outside of those three teams plus the five being mentioned, there's really no one else.

Now let's go through the five teams most likely to move to LA:

1) Vikings. They appeared to be the leading candidate for a while, but the tide has turned recently. There are now two competing proposals (much like LA) to build a new Vikings stadium. These efforts are backed by Goodell, who has stated numerous times that he wants the Vikings to stay in Minnesota because it serves a large regional population. The NFL is willing to contribute to such efforts.

2) Rams. Of the five teams, the Rams have been the least discussed. There is a wealth of circumstantial evidence (of which I will not restate again) to suggest that a return to LA is very plausible. That being said, it is unclear what Kroenke's true intentions are. Does he really want to keep the Rams in his home state of Missouri? Or is that just an empty promise to conceal another plan? Regardless, it is unlikely that Missourians will fund the necessary improvements to the EDJ, let alone a new stadium altogether.

3) Jaguars. The 30-year lease pretty much crosses them off the list. That and an owner who has outspokenly declared that he will not move the Jags.

4) Raiders. They play in what is probably the shittiest stadium there is. They need a facility ASAP. I'm really not caught up to speed on the latest news regarding the new stadium in Santa Clara. If that stadium doesn't get built soon, then I have to think a relocation is quite possible.

5) Chargers. Probably the current frontrunner to relocate. I don't know where their new stadium proposal currently stands.

...

Basically, I think it comes down to the Rams, Raiders, and Chargers, which is what I have been hoping for all along.

mongozx

June 12th, 2011, 12:24 PM

5) Chargers. Probably the current frontrunner to relocate. I don't know where their new stadium proposal currently stands.

AEg wants a stake in whomever moves to their proposed facility. This eliminates the Chargers :)

http://sports.espn.go.com/nfl/news/story?id=6649477

pesto

June 12th, 2011, 07:42 PM

A couple of problems with the Raiders.

Santa Clara requires very little in the way of a move and no talk about taking a controlling interest. Renting from the Niners would be embarrassing, however.

There would be a lot of pressure not to spend any taxpayer money on relocating a team from another California city. The Bay Area still has disproportionate influence in Sacramento.

The Raiders have a bad history in LA. Some people will be very strongly opposed.

The majority control issue will not sit well with Al Davis. AEG may have to get an option upon his death (assuming he is not immortal).

Wildcard: what if Roski promises to rename Industry to "Raidertown" and gives Al complete control until his retirement at which point Roski gets an option to buy at FMV? The Raider image is more of an Inland Empire kind of team (working class, pick-up trucks, drugs, machismo) than, say, LA or Pasadena.

Westsidelife

June 13th, 2011, 07:43 AM

AEg wants a stake in whomever moves to their proposed facility. This eliminates the Chargers :)

http://sports.espn.go.com/nfl/news/story?id=6649477

Do they? I don't ever recall reading that. [edit: okay, my mistake]

I hope you're right though. I want the Raiders back. :)

LosAngelesSportsFan

June 14th, 2011, 05:43 AM

i thought you wanted the rams back?

I still think that AEG can make it work with the current Chargers ownership group. i think they will structure something very similar to what they have with the Lakers and get it done. i would prefer the Rams, but whatever, lets get a damn team here already.

Westsidelife

June 14th, 2011, 01:34 PM

^ LA is a 2-team market. Rams and Raiders FTW!

Westsidelife

June 14th, 2011, 01:36 PM

To be honest, I really don't know what's going to happen after reading how Anschutz wants a majority stake in whichever NFL team plays in Farmers Field. None of those five teams are up for sale.

Franchise646

June 20th, 2011, 09:24 PM

http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/opinionla/la-ed-football-20110619,0,3488433.story

Ever since the Los Angeles Raiders took their ball and went home to Oakland in the mid-1990s, Los Angeles has waged an intermittent and sometimes half-hearted campaign to lure the National Football League back to the city, by far the nation's largest without a football team. That effort has been marked by exuberance and disappointment, misdirection and considerable public indifference. As the City Council takes the measure of a new proposal to construct a football stadium downtown, it should recall that history in full — realizing that the city's future does not depend on whether the NFL plays here, but also appreciating that it should not let the most promising football deal it has ever received slip through its fingers because it was too slow or too political to reason effectively.

While safeguarding the city's interests, the council should, over the next few weeks, do what it often finds difficult: act decisively, in this case to approve a memorandum of understanding with AEG, the Denver-based sports and entertainment group, and allow the stadium to move forward.

What's in it for L.A.?

Although some residents have long been eager for football to return, the quest for a local team has failed to engage many others who care little about the sport and have plenty of options to entertain themselves. The conventional draw for a team — the desire for the prestige it would confer — has been notably absent here. But if Los Angeles doesn't need the prestige of a team, it does have other reasons to want this deal. AEG and its chief executive, Tim Leiweke, have revitalized the south end of downtown with their phenomenally successful Staples Center and adjoining LA Live. Once a collection of dilapidated buildings and parking lots, the area now is a hub of sports, entertainment, restaurants and hotels, as vibrant late at night as it is during the day. The stadium would build on that with an arena large enough to hold events as diverse as Pac 12 football, the Final Four, soccer and major concerts.

That means jobs — not just temporary construction jobs but also permanent positions at the stadium as well as at the stores, restaurants and hotels that this project is expected to attract. And with those jobs would come tax revenue for the city, county and schools, benefits that even the least passionate sports fan can appreciate.

There is an additional aspect of this project that makes it more attractive than other recent football proposals. It promises not only a team and the development that accompanies it, but the rescue of a stranded civic facility, the beleaguered Los Angeles Convention Center. As envisioned by AEG and Leiweke, the new stadium would sit on the land now occupied by the center's West Hall. That hall is aging and unworkable, disconnected from the newer, larger South Hall. For it to be functional and appealing, the city estimates that it needs $80 million worth of improvements. Instead, AEG proposes that the new stadium replace the West Hall and link up to the South Hall, creating a vast, contiguous convention space — enough to attract the very large conventions that are today out of Los Angeles' reach.

Then there is the tax revenue the project is expected to generate. Today, the city barely breaks even on the operations of the convention center and is saddled with more than $45 million of annual debt service on the South Hall. If the stadium is built, one consulting firm hired by AEG predicts that it would spur development of 3,064 new hotel rooms, which would nearly double the tax revenue currently generated by existing hotel rooms downtown. That analysis suggests an additional $26 million to $33 million in bed taxes for the city; it also estimates that the increase in convention business from major conventions alone would produce an additional $228 million in annual spending — with the state and local governments getting their share of that in taxes. If those estimates hold, then, the city would not only get a new convention center but would be able to pay off its existing one.

That by itself is reason to support this proposal.

What should the council look out for?

The proposed stadium turns on a paradox: If AEG manages only to run it as a football stadium — with 10 to 12 games a year, mostly on Sundays — the effect on traffic and parking downtown would barely be felt. But if AEG maximizes its
potential by holding more events, and thus delivering more in jobs and taxes, then its negative effects would escalate as well. In other words, the more successful the facility is, the more it may inconvenience residents. The council should recognize that conundrum and insist on the rigorous analysis that will flesh out the implications of the project.

Where it gets even more complicated is in AEG's plans for boxing or wrestling or the Final Four. Those events and others like them take place at all hours and would put real stress on the area's already groaning road network. Recognizing that, AEG has grand dreams of bolstering the public transportation options around LA Live and of hosting the first Super Bowl in history at which most fans arrive on foot, either from nearby hotels or from train stations or shuttles. It's the council's duty to see that those plans are not just selling tools but real proposals cemented in the ultimate deal, with AEG bearing its share of the responsibility for planning and funding them.

AEG is also seeking protection from the California Environmental Quality Act, which allows those affected by projects — including, in some cases, competitors — to file lawsuits blocking them. AEG is hardly the only entity to protest some of CEQA's more permissive litigation rules, and a wholesale review of the act is not only in order but in fact underway in Sacramento. If those negotiations result in constructive CEQA reform that helps AEG, so much the better. That said, AEG does not deserve its own environmental law. It should, as it has promised, complete an environmental impact report for the project, and neither the city nor state should exempt it from the rules that apply to others.

Finally and most important, the city needs to be a vigilant guardian of the public purse. The estimates for this project appear to pencil out favorably for the city, but officials need to recall that the convention center once looked like a good investment too. As part of this deal, the city would get new taxes generated by the nearby hotels, stores and restaurants. But it would give up much of the property and sales taxes generated by the new stadium itself (the county and state would keep their share) and allow that money to pay off the bonds used to finance construction. City officials need to see that the government coffers are protected in return.

Initially, AEG proposed taking over the city land beneath the West Hall for $1 a year, on the theory that it was also taking on the responsibility of renovating that hall for the city's benefit. As negotiations have progressed, the two sides now are talking about AEG paying fair-market value for the land. That's appropriate.

The state of play

Earlier this month, Leiweke told Los Angeles Times reporter Sam Farmer that he was losing patience with the City Council, and indicated he was getting ready to walk away. "I'm OK if we get to July 31 and we don't get a deal done," he said. "We move on." Leiweke's apparent imposition of an ultimatum was unseemly — he's already seen by many to wield outsize influence at City Hall — but his impatience is understandable. Los Angeles is an infamously difficult place to pull off a large project.

The council doesn't do anything fast. And, in this case, it's dealing with a project of considerable complexity and uncertainty. It should protect the environment, look for ways to make sure that traffic and parking problems are anticipated, and make AEG pay its share of a project that will reap significant returns. And it should do so quickly.

The construction of a football stadium — or the failure to build it — will not alter the essence of Los Angeles. What AEG has built downtown is no more an expression of Los Angeles than the company's nearly identical KC Live is of Kansas City. These are centers of commerce and entertainment, not culture. Indeed, they come at some cost to culture, as a new stadium will draw business from both the Los Angeles Coliseum and Pasadena's Rose Bowl, authentic monuments to the region's history.

But that history also includes a healthy appreciation for the new, an embrace of commerce and even glitz. A new stadium may create traffic snarls, but so do Dodger Stadium and the Los Angeles Times Festival of Books. Residents complain but grudgingly accept that the area's most appealing attractions come with caveats. And in return, this deal promises jobs, tax revenue and the revitalization of a city asset.

The recent images of the mayor and council members rushing to have their pictures taken with Leiweke did not inspire confidence that the city would strike a hard bargain. Since then, however, the negotiations have sweetened and clarified the benefits. Now, it's incumbent on the city's leadership to quit dawdling, focus on their obligation to the public, and cut the deal.

saiholmes

June 29th, 2011, 04:19 AM

AEG's Tim Leiweke says proposed NFL stadium plan will call for less money in bonds
At town hall meeting, he says $350 million will be cut to 'the high $200 millions,' as AEG would pay for and control two parking garages in original request. Councilman says new offer appears better.
By Sam Farmer, Los Angeles Times
10:00 PM PDT, June 27, 2011

Executive Tim Leiweke, spearheading a drive to build a downtown NFL stadium, said AEG this week will present a revised financing plan to the city, one that calls for less money in bonds and contractually obligated revenue to cover them.

Leiweke, speaking Monday night at a town hall meeting in Mar Vista, said the original request of $350 million in municipal bonds to relocate the West Hall of the Convention Center, where the proposed Farmers Field will sit, will be reduced to "the high $200 millions." The bonds would be reduced because AEG would pay for and control two parking garages. Further, he said AEG will lease the stadium land and secure advertising deals that, when combined, will equal the bond payments. The previous plan called for AEG to cover any payment shortfall on a year-by-year basis.

"The general fund will not be at risk," said Leiweke, who will present the latest plan Thursday to the city's ad hoc committee reviewing the offer.

Leiweke said AEG needs to know by July 31 — after which the City Council goes on summer break — if the city will agree to the framework of a deal. He said that deadline will keep the company on track to begin construction of a new West Hall on June 1, 2012, which will require two years. He said a stadium would be ready for the start of the 2016 season.

Among those at the town hall were City Councilmen Bill Rosendahl and Paul Koretz, as Leiweke and AEG executives answered questions from neighborhood representatives.

Koretz said that at first glimpse, the new offer appears better than the last.

"By having a good degree of healthy skepticism, this plan already is considerably better than the one that originally came to us," he said.

"We have to make sure that, in the absolute worst-case scenario, no matter what goes wrong — and unfortunately with the Dodgers, we've seen what can happen — that the city is still in good financial shape."

Read More: http://www.latimes.com/sports/la-sp-nfl-stadium-aeg-20110628,0,6558140.story

klamedia

June 29th, 2011, 07:32 PM

2 parking garages? Where? How large? Will this undercut the emphasis placed on our mass transit system?

LosAngelesSportsFan

June 30th, 2011, 01:21 AM

no this was always in the plan.

Westsidelife

June 30th, 2011, 09:48 AM

Report: Vikings stadium deal close
http://profootballtalk.nbcsports.com/2011/06/29/report-vikings-stadium-deal-close/

---

Robert Kraft yesterday publicly sounding off that the Raiders and Rams are the two teams that Roger Goodell wants to put in Los Angeles.

Music to my ears @ 11:40.

http://www.xxsportsradio.com/common/global_audio/40/30956.mp3

ryebreadraz

June 30th, 2011, 08:10 PM

2 parking garages? Where? How large? Will this undercut the emphasis placed on our mass transit system?

There were always going to be two garages. One is 4,000 spots to replace the 3,000 spot grage currently at the West Hall and another is additional parking. The original plan had the bonds paying for it and the city operating them though, but now AEG will pay for them and operate them. That's what has changed.

soup or man

June 30th, 2011, 10:24 PM

From Curbed:

Another piece of the Farmers Field NFL stadium puzzle falls into place today as AEG announces the selection of an architect for the LA Convention Center's reconstructed West Hall: Populous. The international firm pretty much only designs sports stadiums and convention centers, and has next-door neighbor Staples Center under its belt, as well as San Francisco's AT&T Park. The story gets interesting here: principal Dan Meis was also the architect on Majestic Realty's competing stadium proposal in the City of Industry, reports the LA Times. Apparently no conflict of interest, as only one proposal will get built -- and if City of Industry's flies, then AEG's doesn't, including the convention center proposal. Via the AP, Majestic Realty's chief says, "We gave them complete permission. They have done all the architecture work on our project and will do the architecture work on our stadium after we purchase a team and begin construction." (Oh, snap!) Earlier this week AEG said they would reduce the amount of bond money they saw as necessary for the reconstruction of West Hall, or as they call it under its new name, Pico Hall. Whatever it's called, plans call for it to break ground by next June, with the goal of not causing any disruptions to already planned events.

klamedia

June 30th, 2011, 10:29 PM

AEG has answered my concern:

AEG’s Transpo. Plan, Early Returns Good, but the Devil Remains in the Details.
http://la.streetsblog.org/2011/06/28/aegs-transpo-plan-early-returns-good-but-the-devil-remains-in-the-details/
by Damien Newton on June 28, 2011

Last night, dozens of Westsiders and union members packed into the Mar Vista Recreation Center to watch the Bill and Tim Show. Hosted by Councilman Bill Rosendahl, a former talk show host, and featuring special guest AEG CEO Tim Leiweke, the two hammed it up with the help of a team of able sidekicks and more often than not brought applause from the audience as they sold Westsiders on an improved convention center and new football stadium.

A dapper Leiweke holds court last night in Mar Vista.

The headline-grabbing news of the night was Leiweke’s announcement that AEG has reworked their proposed deal to the city to reduce the amount of bonds the sports entertainment giant would purchase from the city. But the CEO, sans-sports jacket but looking dapper in a suit vest, also outlined a pretty progressive transportation plan, going so far as to beg a questioner who argued that nobody wants to “walk 15 minutes in Downtown Los Angeles” to “Take light rail. Please. Take light rail, we all should be doing that more.” You can read more about AEG’s bonding and fiscal proposals at LA Observed and the Times. Streetsblog will be looking at parts of the transportation plan after the jump.

In our past coverage, Streetsblog outlined what we believe are four things AEG can do to allay transportation concerns about the stadium right now. We’ll examine, based on what we know, how AEG is doing in meeting those goals.

But first, one thing we haven’t mentioned in past pieces that is critical to a stadium or team owner committing to a true progressive transportation plan is that the parking spaces to serve the events center should not be controlled by either the stadium owner or team owner. One of the problems working with the Dodgers to bring transit to Dodger Stadium is that they benefit from the dangerous conditions created by their out-of-control parking lot. Ted Tanner, the head of real estate for AEG, estimated to Streetsblog that AEG would only own or rent about 8,000 spaces on event day with another 24,000 being controlled by outside interests.

That’s a good start.

Streetsblog also asked that the transportation study for the stadium be peer reviewed and made public before the city enter any Memorandum of Understanding with AEG over the Stadium and Convention Center project. Leiweke addressed that concern by outlining that the environmental review for the stadium will be completed by “June 1, 2012″ and that any MOU with the city will allow for the city to back out if they are unhappy with the review. Leiweke also promised a first-rate plan for the site that includes not just traffic counts, but also pedestrian counts and transit counts. It is certainly a far cry from promising a peer reviewed traffic study, but it’s a good start.

Second, we urged AEG to come up with, and make public, a plan to encourage visitors to take transit to the Stadium. In this respect, AEG is really ahead of the curve. Promising free tickets to Metrolink customers, free DASH service from Union Station, and bundling transit costs in with ticket costs for people buying online; AEG promises a transit plan that is second-to-none to get people to and from the ballpark.
“We know the light rail station at Pico will need to be upgraded, and we plan on doing that,” Leiweke promised, inadvertently referencing the Sierra Club’s proposal for the station. Walking home from the meeting, I asked three of my fellow Mar Vista residents how they would get to events downtown, the unscientific but unanimous result: The Expo Line.

AEG executives were very excited about Metrolink’s success moving 5% of all concert goers to a U2 Concert in Anaheim. If one rail service can handle 5% of traffic, imagine with Metrolink, the Gold Line, the Expo Line and Downtown Trolley can do even before the Regional Connector and other rail lines come on line.

Third, we discussed bike parking. I have to admit a personal bias because of the almost romantic idea of biking to a Bears game in December, but outside of my feelings, urban stadiums are experiencing great success with bike valet programs. Leiweke didn’t have a firm plan for bikes, and neither did his transportation expert Mike Bates. What is clear is that while AEG is basing a lot of their stadium plans based on the success of Staples Center, they’re going to have to do better when it comes to providing safe, accessible, ways for people to store their bikes.

The last major issue is whether or not AEG will lobby the state for protection from CEQA lawsuits. Leiweke professes to fear that Ed Roski, the billionare developer of a rival stadium in the City of Industry, will file suit against Farmers Field for no other reason than the political damage and delay it could cause the Downtown Stadium project. While they won’t be seeking an exemption from legal challenges to their stadium plans, AEG is planning to ask for expedited decisions through a sort of mediation panel instead of being forced to go to court to address every challenge. Details on how such a proposal would work weren’t readily available last night, but it’s something that AEG has backed off verbiage asking for the same sweetheart deal Roski got from the legislature in 2009.

Some other notes from last night:

Anyone that represents Bill Rosendahl as an opponent of the stadium doesn’t know what they’re talking about. Rosendahl introduced Leiweke as, “a man who’s out front bringing this thing together.” Later, the two posed for a bear hug.
One of the perils of working with Neighborhood Councils and allowing them to dominate the Q and A portion of the evening is that you end up with a pretty homogeneous demographic breakdown. By my count, there were over two dozen speakers. Two were women, two were African-American, and two were under the age of 50.
The “July 31 deadline” for an MOU that Leiweke has pushed in the press appears to be a real one. The Council is allegedly planning hearings in mid-July to move the project.
There will be some new car parking with the development. AEG estimates an increase of 1,290 spaces bringing the total number of parking spaces for the 72,000 seat stadium to just under 30,000.

saiholmes

July 1st, 2011, 04:37 AM

Deadline on NFL stadium expected to be met
BY SCOTT M. REID
Orange County Register
2011-06-30 15:53:43

LOS ANGELES – The chairman of the Los Angeles City Council committee studying a proposed downtown stadium said she expects the council to reach preliminary agreement with Anschutz Entertainment Group in the coming weeks on the Farmers Field project, clearing a major hurdle in AEG's bid to bring the NFL back to Southern California.

Councilwoman Jan Perry, chairman of the ad hoc committee, on Thursday said that city council should be ready to enter into a memorandum of understanding with AEG before the council's summer recess in late July or early August, meeting a deadline set by AEG president Tim Leiweke for the $1.35 billion project to move forward.

The memo of understanding is an agreement on the general principles of a deal and an outline for a final contract. AEG said it hopes to have a final deal with the city done by May 2012.

As AEG officials submitted a new proposal to city officials, the committee received criticism from one of its own members for a decision to be briefed on the city's ongoing negotiations with AEG in private.

Los Angeles chief legislative analyst Gerry Miller plans to brief committee members on negotiations as well as ask for direction in future negotiations with AEG from the panel. A city attorney, citing a state open meeting law, recommended to the committee that Miller's briefing of the five-member panel be done in private.

But councilman Bill Rosendahl said he opposed a private briefing, arguing that there should be greater transparency in the city's dealings with AEG.

"I'm very uncomfortable with the five of us going into a meeting to negotiate this privately," Rosendahl said during a committee meeting Thursday.

Councilman Ed Reyes was quick to respond to Rosendahl.

"I want to emphasize there are no backroom deals," Reyes said.

At Perry's suggestion, Miller will meet with the committee members individually. Rosendahl said his briefing by Miller will be public, perhaps in a town hall setting.

"I think that's a little bit of grandstanding," Perry said of Rosendahl later.

Councilman Tony Cardenas said its important that the briefings stay private because of the sensitivity of the negotiations.

"These negotiations are very delicate," Cardenas said. "And you don't want to (anger) the people on the other side of the table by something you might say in (the briefings)."

Miller said while the city and AEG are "making good progress" in the negotiations there remains "two or three" points of contention with "significant financial impact."

AEG has sought to address city officials concerns about the security of city issued bonds that would pay for the renovation of the Los Angeles Convention Center's West Hall.

AEG has proposed building a $1 billion privately funded stadium on the current site of the West Hall. A new West Hall would be financed by the public bonds.

Under AEG's most recent proposal those bonds would be repaid by advertising revenue, property taxes generated by the project and a ground lease.

AEG has also said it will now pay for the construction of two parking garages which the corporation has said will reduce the amount of bonds needed to build the convention hall from $350-million to under $300-million.

"The bottom line is this is just business," Cardenas said. "AEG wants to find a way to get a stadium built and we're looking for someone to invest in our convention center. AEG already has over $1-billion invested in this one small area so this is more important for them."

Read More: http://www.ocregister.com/sports/aeg-306604-city-committee.html

saiholmes

July 1st, 2011, 07:25 AM

If you build it (a downtown NFL stadium), L.A. will come
AEG has lived up to its word on Staples Center, and deserves the opportunity to bring football back to town. Pro football games are the center of a national conversation that should involve us.
Bill Plaschke
Los Angeles Times
10:07 PM PDT, June 30, 2011

I've crunched the numbers and read the proposals and listened to the spin and, frankly, it makes my brain wobble like a Raiders fan in a china shop.

For me, the decision about the future of the NFL in Los Angeles is much more simple: two questions, one solution.

Do you like Staples Center? Do you like football?

If both answers are yes — and for most people, they are — then you should support the tax-free idea that the folks who built Staples Center are going to build us a new stadium.

The Los Angeles City Council will hopefully make that approval official by a July 31 deadline imposed by AEG, at which point the fun begins.

By next summer, we'll have a team, because AEG will not begin the stadium project without one.

By the fall of 2012, that team — the San Diego Chargers and Jacksonville Jaguars are the leading candidates — will begin play in either the Rose Bowl or the Coliseum.

By the fall of 2016, that team will move into Farmers Field to complete a sports-fueled downtown revitalization unmatched in this country's history, and all those politicians who supported AEG will be heroes, and everyone will be wondering why this took so long.

It's simple, it's savvy, and it starts now, with our elected officials surely realizing what everyone who has been to Staples Center already knows.

The building works. The parking works. The traffic works. More than a decade after making a bunch of outlandish promises, AEG has lived up to its word, building and running a world-class facility that costs taxpayers virtually nothing.

With AEG making the same sorts of promises to build a football stadium, it has earned our faith and deserves that chance, especially because this time it's a two-for-one deal, with the project including replacing the Convention Center's aging West Hall.

I am such a fan of Staples Center — is there any better giant arena in sports? — that I would support AEG building a downtown stadium even if it was only used for soccer and motocross. The fact that it is building this stadium to host a team that is part of our new national pastime only seals the deal.

Do I suddenly think Los Angeles wants or needs an NFL team? Absolutely not. This is a city of two dozen favorite NFL teams; just check out the sports bars on Sundays, filled with transplants cheering for home. The Raiders and Rams have been gone more than 15 years and I don't think I've heard more than 15 people complain about it.

We have not missed an NFL team, but I do think we've missed the NFL experience, those weekly games that have become the center of a national conversation that no longer involves us. Seemingly every day during the fall, the NFL dominates the sports culture so much that, at times, it really does seem as if we're missing out on all the fun.

Imagine the outcry if Broadway shows or national operas simply stop coming here. Imagine you had to fly elsewhere for your culture fix. That's what happened for sports fans when the NFL left town and, while we still have favorite teams, we have lost America's favorite game.

The weekly scrums are the most-watched events in sports, it would be a blast to have access to them again, and since having a team is the only way to be able to do that, well, why not? And, incidentally, my guess is that within a year of their arrival, the new Los Angeles franchise would be the most popular sports team in town, with more fans than even the Lakers, because the NFL is that big.

So it all works, except for the part in which AEG king Phil Anschutz would be part owner of the new team. Really? Even after Frank McCourt and Donald Sterling, this guy has quietly become the worst owner in town, running a Kings' franchise that annually underperforms for its passionate fans.

The guy has no business running a sports franchise, and here's hoping nobody gives him more than 49% of anything. But he and lieutenant Tim Leiweke have been brilliant when it comes to running sports arenas, and if they want to spend $3 billion on a project that will bring a football palace to Los Angeles …

Let them. It's time. Farmers Field not only sounds as if it should be nestled in some fictional Iowa cornfield, but it feels that way too.

Read More: http://www.latimes.com/sports/la-sp-0701-plaschke-20110701,0,7101790.column

saiholmes

July 1st, 2011, 07:37 AM

nVOm5Ux6Zpk

saiholmes

July 22nd, 2011, 05:36 AM

How AEG runs the show
AEG, which is pushing for a risky Los Angeles football stadium project, has been skilled at figuring out what public officials care about and then tailoring projects to meet those needs.
By Jessica Garrison and Alex Pham, Los Angeles Times
July 22, 2011

When AEG executives signed the final documents to take over the Millennium Dome in London, giggles could be heard in the adjacent room.

The 860,000-square-foot entertainment dome was regarded as something of a national joke that had soaked up $1 billion in British taxpayers' money and was mothballed before the Los Angeles-based venue operator showed up with an offer.

"It was like they couldn't believe these silly Americans were dumb enough to do this," Anschutz Entertainment Group chief Tim Leiweke recalled.

Ten years later, it's AEG that's laughing.

After a half-billion-dollar makeover that included an 11-screen cinema, a museum and two concert halls, plus a new name — The O2, thanks to a sponsorship deal with the British telecommunications giant — the London venue became the world's most popular concert stage in 2009 and 2010, by number of tickets sold.

The O2 metamorphosis, AEG boosters say, is just one example of the global firm's aptitude for spotting, shaping and selling risky projects. The company is leaning on that record to pull off what Leiweke characterizes as AEG's riskiest project yet: a $1.35-billion football stadium in downtown Los Angeles.

That proposal is fraught with uncertainty. Assuming early City Hall political support holds through talks on a development deal, AEG would have to win over an NFL franchise, probably by persuading an existing team to move here.

It would build "Farmers Field" on public land by moving the west wing of the Los Angeles Convention Center, using nearly $300 million borrowed by the city. Knowing the city is financially strapped, the company has promised to pay for all stadium work and any shortfall in tax revenue needed to pay for rebuilding the Convention Center.

Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa backs the idea, and city analysts have spent weeks negotiating a detailed deal framework, which is expected to be released next week. Leiweke recently warned that he might call off the stadium project if the City Council does not pass a preliminary deal before members take August vacations.

One skeptic is Greg Nelson, who was chief of staff to then-Los Angeles Councilman Joel Wachs when AEG was negotiating to build downtown's Staples Center. He said stadium proposals often overstate their economic value to a city and understate the cost to taxpayers — yet developers are able to tap the "incredible emotional appeal" of sports.

AEG, Nelson said, is especially good at that. "They are master co-opters. They understand how to push the buttons of elected officials — and what it takes to get their support.... They hire the best political consultants and lobbyists who can tell them what it's going to take. It doesn't make them [different] than anyone else, except they seem to be doing it much better and much more."

Since AEG was formed to build Staples Center in 1995, the company has undergone a world-encompassing transformation. By repeatedly finding underappreciated properties, rallying public subsidies and gaining corporate sponsorships to minimize its own exposure, it has ballooned into a $10-billion entertainment and real estate powerhouse.

Privately financed by Philip Anschutz, a reclusive Denver billionaire, the company now owns or manages 100 venues around the globe. There are arenas from Charlotte, N.C., to Sydney, Australia, to Shanghai, and theaters and clubs on the Las Vegas strip and in Times Square. Six convention centers stand in Australia, Malaysia, Oman and Qatar. And four stadiums host soccer, football and rugby in Carson; East Hartford, Conn.; Stockholm; and Brisbane, Australia.

Like an oil driller that discovers crude and then ships, refines and pumps it from affiliated stations, AEG has achieved part of its success by offering a vertically integrated menu unique to its industry. It can develop and operate an arena like Staples, then assure it has something to present by booking the acts and owning the teams that play inside. In Los Angeles alone, AEG holds all or part of the Kings, the Galaxy and the Lakers.

Its concert wing produced 4,500 performances last year, including tours by Bon Jovi, Taylor Swift and the Black Eyed Peas, making it the nation's second-largest promoter, after Live Nation Entertainment Inc. And 49 other divisions combine to push merchandise, stream videos and stage Hollywood galas.

The company's front man has always been Leiweke, 54, a charismatic rainmaker who doesn't have a business degree or even a college diploma — he left school after a year in a Denver junior college. What he does have, admirers say, is a salesman's touch with key stakeholders.

From the day it launched its $350-million Staples construction — with a $71-million boost from City Hall — the company has been skilled at figuring out what public officials care about and then tailoring projects to meet those needs.

In Portland, Ore., a city famous for its environmentalism, AEG made sure the revamped Rose Garden arena secured a coveted gold rating from the U.S. Green Building Council. In addition to providing energy-efficient heating and air conditioning, AEG encourages spectators to compost their unfinished hotdog buns and popcorn.

When the issue has been feeding the public coffers, AEG has been accommodating there, too. In return for $276 million in public financing for the Sprint Center in Kansas City, Mo., the company agreed to share arena profits above 16%, netting the city about $2 million a year. The O2 agreement in London calls for the United Kingdom to get 15% of net profits for 25 years; in 2009, the venue reported after-tax income of about $20 million.

AEG also marshals vital allies such as organized labor, a political force in L.A. known for making hefty financial contributions and launching aggressive get-out-the-vote drives. The county's 11.9% unemployment rate has enabled the company to stress that jobs would flow from building and staffing a football stadium.

In the spring, when AEG announced its plans, construction workers were showing up to support the stadium at "every single council meeting," City Councilman Paul Krekorian said.

AEG executives have never been shy about making political contributions to key allies, especially in Los Angeles. Leiweke said it happens here more than in other AEG cities "because this is where we live."

Records show that since 2000, AEG and its affiliates have doled out nearly $2.7 million in contributions across California. Within L.A., AEG and its parent company, Anschutz Corp., have given at least $200,000 in recent years to campaigns that backed Villaraigosa's slate of school board candidates.

In 2008, AEG gave $100,000 to the mayor's campaign for a utility users' tax and sent letters urging other corporate donors to do the same. And this spring, 13 individual AEG employees stepped up to give a combined $6,300 to help Councilman Bernard C. Parks win a tough reelection battle.

The company has relied on recruiting partners that help it share the burden and risk of its projects. With the proposed football stadium, for example, AEG sold the naming rights to Farmers Insurance Group for $700 million over a 30-year period. Plans are also underway for AEG to recruit second-tier sponsors that would bring in tens of millions of dollars each year.

The deal also hinges on AEG's ability to recruit an existing NFL team to relocate to Los Angeles and become the stadium's anchor tenant. Owning a piece of that team is crucial. That's because the owner of each NFL team receives $117 million a year in national television broadcasting revenue, according to Robert Baade, an economics professor at Lake Forest College, near Chicago.

"That means the games can be played to empty stadiums, and the owners would still do well," said Baade, who analyzes the economics of professional sports stadiums.

As with its other projects, the company sees further opportunities to extract multiple streams of revenue. A stadium, for example, could be used to attract the largest conventions, bolstering occupancy at AEG's nearby JW Marriott Hotel — financed with as much as $270 million in city assistance.

It could also book concerts there. But "there are only a handful of concerts that can play stadiums," said Gary Bongiovanni, publisher of Pollstar, an industry publication that tracks live events. "If you look at the stadiums across the country, they're mostly dark."

Making the stadium profitable would require 40 to 50 events a year, possibly including monster truck rallies, national college basketball tournaments and major religious gatherings. Only 10 or 11 of those would be NFL games, Leiweke estimated.

"For us, if the stadium was just a stand-alone decision, we would never do this," said Leiweke, who admits there are a lot of what-ifs to his stadium dreams.

"As Phil [Anschutz] likes to remind me, there's a lot that could go wrong with this one," he said. "It's just riskier than anything we've ever done before."

Read More: http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-aeg-analysis-20110722,0,7065171.story

saiholmes

July 25th, 2011, 05:07 AM

vahebaronian

July 25th, 2011, 04:30 PM

It's crunch time..couple more meetings this week, and I believe the city council vote will go on sometime this week. 14 votes now(minus Janice Hahn). Paul Koretz, Paul Krekorian..will 100% vote no, Bill Rosendahl, Tom Labonge were leaning no (But I think their vote can be changed) and I believe Dennis Zine was leaning no(but not 100% sure)..But even if they all say no, there will 9 yes votes..Which means it will pass..

saiholmes

July 26th, 2011, 04:24 AM

Stadium proponents hope NFL turns attention to L.A.
Downtown has the momentum, as it waits for L.A. City Council to decide on bonds and plans. Roski's team for Grand Crossing sees this as time to re-emphasize merits of its plan.
By Sam Farmer
Los Angeles Times
6:11 PM PDT, July 25, 2011

Once the dust settles on the NFL's new labor agreement, will the league finally start pushing dirt in Los Angeles?

That's what backers of the competing L.A. stadium proposals are hoping, that team owners will turn their attention to the nation's second-largest market now that their first-largest nightmare — a bitter fight with the players — is over.

"For us, the timing is perfect because it's coming at the same time we're finishing what no one thought we could do, which is a deal with the city," said AEG's Tim Leiweke, who hopes to know by the end of the month whether the L.A. City Council will issue roughly $300 million in bonds and approve the just-completed memorandum of understanding for a stadium deal. "It puts a whole new amount of momentum and pressure on us to get going."

Likewise, the point man for Ed Roski's stadium proposal in Grand Crossing (formerly City of Industry) sounds as if they're treating the labor deal like a second starter's pistol, a call to re-emphasize the merits of their plan.

"Ed has never felt it was the right thing to do during a lockout to try to get the owners to focus on L.A.," said John Semcken, Roski's right-hand man. "They had something more important. Now, we want to demonstrate why we think our project is the best for the league, the best for a team, and the best for our fans."

At the moment — and this can change with the ever-shifting stadium landscape — downtown has the momentum. That is the preferred plan of many influential NFL owners, and signs point to the L.A. City Council approving the roughly $300 million in bonds to relocate the West Hall of the Convention Center, where the proposed Farmers Field would sit. Leiweke now says the vote might not happen by his original July 31 target date.

"This may slip into the first week or two of August," he said in a recent interview. The council goes on a two-week break starting Aug. 23. "As long as we're going to get it done before they recess, that's the key. From a timing standpoint, we'd like it closer to July 31 but we understand."

Leiweke's timeline calls for getting the plan entitled and a long-term agreement with a franchise in time to break ground on a new West Hall by June 1, 2012. According to that plan, a team would be playing in L.A., at the Coliseum or Rose Bowl, by next season and would be ready to move into Farmers Field for the 2016 season.

Assuming those bonds are approved — and there are strong indications they will be — AEG's next step will be twofold: continuing the process of getting the land entitled and getting an agreement from a team.

The entitlement process is likely to be sticky. Roski has a completed environmental impact report, plus an environmental exemption from the state that swatted away the last remaining legal challenge to his plan.

AEG isn't likely to get the same exemption — the climate for those has changed in Sacramento — and that means the Farmers Field project, which also will go through the EIR process, won't be as legally bulletproof. And that's Leiweke's main concern, that someone will file a lawsuit with the sole intent of derailing the project.

That's why he's been making frequent trips to Sacramento, talking to legislators and trying to secure a modified version of the exemption Roski got, one that calls for binding arbitration of disputes arising from the Farmers Field EIR, instead of fights that will slog through the courts.

"What we want is a process that doesn't get dragged on for years," he said.

NFL fans in L.A. are used to that, deep into their second decade without a hometown team.

Leiweke is convinced that era is coming to a close.

"When we started this process a year and a half ago, I think most people kind of looked at us, laughed, and said, 'Good luck.' No one thought we'd pull it off," he said.

"And now we're sitting here, and what's changed immensely is everyone is looking around and saying, 'They're going to pull it off. They're going to get a deal done with the city. This is going to happen.' "

Read More: http://www.latimes.com/sports/la-sp-farmer-nfl-la-20110726,0,3017968.story

vahebaronian

July 26th, 2011, 05:25 PM

http://espn.go.com/espnradio/losangeles/play?id=6801669

A podcast with city councilman Bill Rosendahl, who at first was opposed to Farmers Field, now even though he would not admit it, looks he and most others are going to vote yes and pass the bond issue.

losangelino

August 1st, 2011, 03:23 AM

AEG football stadium could be win-win — if L.A. plays it smart
There are still plenty of points on which Los Angeles could be bamboozled or steamrollered.

By Michael Hiltzik

July 31, 2011

Take it from me: If you attend a City Hall hearing on the proposed downtown pro football stadium/convention center project, you better be spry enough to keep out of the way of the stampede.

I refer to the stampede by downtown politicians, business groups and construction unions to drape the proposal with the label of that elusive municipal quarry, the "win-win." That was the case at a hearing last week of the Los Angeles City Council's ad hoc committee on the downtown project, which convened to consider the tentative memorandum of understanding, or MOU, negotiated by city officials with AEG, the operator of Staples Center and the L.A. Live entertainment complex.

AEG, which is owned by Denver billionaire Phil Anschutz, is the promoter of the project, which would be wedged next to Staples Center, L.A. Live and the existing convention center. AEG's president, Tim Leiweke, has displayed a deft touch for making urban commercial developments work. He's also a master salesman. Under his leadership, AEG has built up a reservoir of good will in the city, not least by spreading around millions in political contributions. At the public event where AEG unveiled its proposal in February, the slobbering by L.A. Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa and other politicos was so copious you needed scuba gear to breathe.

So it's perhaps encouraging to see that the city has refashioned AEG's original proposal to shift more financial risk off the taxpayers' shoulders and onto the company. The council even refused Leiweke's demand that it meet a spurious deadline of Monday to approve the tentative MOU, which in any case would still be subject to final revisions. The ad hoc committee will meet again this week, followed by another session of the full council a few days later, presumably for a vote.

AEG has put the council under the gun to approve the tentative MOU before it takes its summer recess in the next few weeks. The implicit threat is that any greater delay could put the deal in jeopardy. Yet nothing good can come of haste, and that sounds like a bluff. More to the point, there are still lots of questions about whether the taxpayers are as protected, and whether the project pencils out as neatly, as the promoters claim.

The supposed win-win is this: AEG would get to build, entirely with private funds, a $1.2-billion NFL football stadium, and Los Angeles would obtain an expanded and upgraded convention center. There would be thousands of jobs, although once construction is completed it's unclear what quality of jobs we're talking about. Minimum-wage ushers and concessionaires? Or better?

The taxpayers won't feel a thing, we're promised. AEG will make the deal pencil out by renting the stadium — on which it's already sold naming rights to Farmers Insurance — to the NFL team that will relocate here and by capturing revenues from other sporting and entertainment events.

AEG will demolish part of the convention center to make room for the stadium, and it will build a new convention center wing to connect to the stadium so the latter can also be turned into convention floor space. The city will float tax-exempt bonds to build the convention wing, and pay them off with new sales taxes and other revenue generated by new conventions and the stadium.

If revenue falls short of debt service, AEG guarantees to make up the difference.

So far, so good. But there are still numerous issues with the project that may not be getting the attention they deserve.

One is that the linchpin of the deal is the NFL, which must approve the relocation of a team to L.A. (Among the leading candidates: the San Diego Chargers.)

But as I've written many times, the NFL is the quintessential unreliable partner. The league has toyed condescendingly with Los Angeles for years. It hasn't yet publicly committed to playing at Farmers Field, though there are signs that it quietly favors the deal. The city's financial consultant, Texas-based Conventions, Sports & Leisure International, observes further that if the league imposes, say, a $500,000 relocation fee on the team's owner, that could raise costs enough to scuttle the deal economically. (Anschutz has indicated that he would want to own part of the L.A. team, but not a majority.) Any sizable upward revision of the cost of the stadium could also wreck the fine financial balance of the MOU.

Councilwoman Jan Perry, head of the ad hoc committee, insisted last week that the project would not "cost taxpayers a dime." That's only true on a "sorta" basis. The city bonds financing the new convention hall will be paid off from the rental and property tax payments AEG makes to the city for the land under the stadium, totaling $10.3 million a year to start, as well from parking taxes charged at city and AEG lots around the project (estimated at $715,000 a year).

That's just a portion of what the city hopes the project will generate, but it does show that a large piece of what the city expects to gain in additional revenues will just be cranked back into debt service. No one would expect to build a new convention center for free, but these revenues are, in a real sense, the taxpayers' "dimes."

As for the financial guarantee, the city's consultants are unhappy that the guarantor is AEG. If the project turns out to be a bust, AEG's bottom line could be the first casualty — possibly hindering its ability to cover losses. CSL says it's "imperative" that the guarantor be an entity with bigger pockets — Anschutz personally, perhaps?

All the financial projections, moreover, implicitly assume that when the bonds are paid off in 34 years, the city will have a lovely stadium and convention complex free and clear.

To the NFL, however, a 30-year-old stadium is a slum, no matter how fancy it was at birth. Convention centers have a shelf life almost as short — the downtown facility opened in 1971, was rehabbed twice in the 1990s and today, less than 20 years later, is a superannuated white elephant compared with its competitors. This raises the issue of who is to pay for the upgrades sure to be demanded by the NFL, AEG or other interested parties long before the new bonds are paid off. From what I could glean, the MOU's 111 pages, incorporating CSL's findings, are silent on the point.

CSL also expressed some misgivings about the value of an expanded convention facility. The firm found that even with additional state-of-the-art space, the number of major conventions — the mega-events that bring in out-of-towners to fill hotel rooms — might increase from an average 24 a year now all the way to 29. That's a lot fewer than the 38 projected by consultants hired by AEG.

As CSL observes, L.A.'s chief regional competitors (Anaheim, San Diego and San Francisco) are upgrading their own convention centers, so they're likely to maintain their competitive lead over L.A. Also, downtown Los Angeles offers only 1,685 hotel rooms within half a mile of the convention center. In Anaheim and San Diego, the figure is closer to 8,000. In San Francisco, it's 19,000. The marketing challenge for even a spiffy new L.A. convention center "should not be underestimated," the consultants wrote, understatedly.

If the city can really get a football stadium built entirely with private funds and upgrade the convention center with a reasonably modest investment, this deal could indeed be a win-win. But there are still plenty of points on which the city could be bamboozled or steamrollered. Would another month's delay to provide for careful scrutiny really be fatal? So far, the council has shown admirable spine in dealing with AEG. This would be the wrong time to convince itself that the road to a stadium has no more hidden potholes.

saiholmes

August 1st, 2011, 04:34 AM

8G8YWgUlMFs

vahebaronian

August 4th, 2011, 06:00 PM

http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/lanow/2011/08/los-angeles-nfl-downtown-stadium-financing-deal-bonds.html

L.A.'s NFL stadium financing plan clears key City Council panel
August 3, 2011 | 8:14 pm
A plan for luring an NFL stadium to downtown Los Angeles cleared a major hurdle Wednesday, with a City Council panel throwing its support behind the financial framework proposed for the project.

On a 4-0 vote, the council’s Ad Hoc Committee on the Downtown Stadium and Convention Center recommended approval of an agreement with developer Anschutz Entertainment Group to build a $1.2 billion stadium and replace a $275 million wing of the Los Angeles Convention Center.

A vote by the full council is scheduled for Tuesday. Approval of the nonbinding agreement sets the stage for another nine months of talks between the two sides. “This is the table setting, not the meal,” said Councilwoman Jan Perry, who voted for the plan and heads the stadium committee.

AEG has promised to finance the stadium, tentatively named Farmers Field, on its own. For that to happen, however, the city would need to tear down the West Hall of its Convention Center -- and issue $275 million in tax-exempt bonds to pay for demolition and relocation of the exhibition area. Those bonds would be repaid largely from new tax and lease income generated by the two projects, according to the proposal.

Committee members Tony Cardenas, Ed Reyes and Bill Rosendahl voted for the proposal. Of the three, Rosendahl had been the biggest skeptic, firing off a series of letters asking about the stadium’s impact on city finances and convention center bookings. In their response, the city’s negotiators told Rosendahl that AEG has promised to reimburse the city for any convention business lost as a result of stadium construction. The company also will cover any shortfalls in tax and lease revenue needed to cover the bond repayment, officials said.
“I’m delighted to see all these answers to my questions,” Rosendahl said shortly before voting for the plan.

As part of its vote, the committee also recommended that the city retain Nixon Peabody, a law firm hired to analyze the project’s bond financing, even though the company disclosed that it has three potential conflicts of interest. One is that it represents Regal Cinemas, a tenant of AEG’s LA Live entertainment complex, which is near the stadium site. Philip Anschutz, chairman of AEG, is also an investor in Regal, according to city officials.

A second conflict involves Nixon Peabody's representation of Anschutz Exploration Corp., another Anschutz company. A third is that a lawyer with the law firm previously worked for Majestic Realty, which is backing a competing stadium plan. Deputy City Atty. Marilyn Garcia said those client relationships would not compromise Nixon Peabody’s work on the stadium deal for the city.

Fewer than 50 people showed up for the evening committee meeting. The session was a sharp contrast to Friday’s council meeting, when hundreds of union members, business officials and high school football players packed the council chamber to push for approval of the deal.

Nevertheless, the proposal drew criticism from Quentin Fleming, a Pacific Palisades-based management consultant who said he believes that AEG’s financial return on the stadium will be more than triple the amount projected by the city’s economic consultants. Fleming also said those consultants should have independently verified the numbers submitted by AEG.

“It would be beneficial if we could have an independent person, someone without a vested interest, perhaps even a city employee themselves, take a look at the numbers,” he said.

The unanimous support for the project drew criticism from Venice resident David Ewing, who compared the stadium discussion at City Hall to the run up to the Iraq war in the U.S. Congress eight years ago. “It’s all flag waving and rah rah rah,” he said.

vahebaronian

August 9th, 2011, 10:14 PM

L.A. NFL stadium agreement approved by City Council on 12-0 vote
August 9, 2011 | 12:51 pm

The plan to build a $1.2-billion NFL stadium in downtown Los Angeles took a big leap forward Tuesday when the City Council approved the overall framework for financing the project.

On a 12-0 vote, the council voted for a nonbinding agreement with stadium developer Anschutz Entertainment Group that allows for the demolition and relocation of a section of the Los Angeles Convention Center. That, in turn, would make room for a 72,000-seat stadium just south of Staples Center, which would open in 2016 with the planned name of Farmers Field.

“Today, in moving this forward, we don’t lose one bit of leverage. We don’t lose one bit of control,” said Council President Eric Garcetti. “The great suggestions that people make along the way, we can sit down and talk to folks about. But it is time to take the next brave step forward.”

Approval of the stadium plan would kick off nine months of intensive negotiations with AEG, which has promised to pay for the new stadium and two parking garages on its own dime. And it would allow city planners to press ahead with preparation of an environmental impact report on the project, which would assess such issues as traffic, noise and glare in nearby neighborhoods.

The city plans to issue $275 million in bonds to pay for the new Convention Center wing. Up to 49% of the new revenue generated by the two projects -- taxes and lease revenue -- would be used to pay off that debt.

City Administrative Officer Miguel Santana said a vote in favor of the tentative agreement would tell the council's negotiators that they are heading in the right direction. "It also signals to AEG that, in fact, we're serious about this, and they can begin their process and ... put their funding together," he said.

The council's three biggest stadium skeptics -- Bill Rosendahl, Paul Koretz and Paul Krekorian -- all fell in line behind the plan, saying they believed that taxpayers would be protected in the deal.

“I’ve looked at this and I’ve studied it and I’ve argued against it, as you have all heard,” Krekorian told his colleagues. “And I have become convinced that the financial terms that have been negotiated by our negotiating team are such that the risks are minimal, if not non-existent.”
City officials expect the stadium to create more than 14,000 construction jobs and 6,300 permanent jobs while making it possible for the city to renovate its Convention Center at a time of tight budgets. Still, the proposal has drawn sharp questions from residents who live near the stadium site who are worried about the traffic that will pour onto local streets and the 110/10 freeway interchange.

Others contend that the city should be able to get a share of the profits from Farmers Field, and warn that the economic upside for AEG -- which owns nearby Staples Center and the L.A. Live entertainment complex -- has been significantly downplayed. Management consultant Quentin Fleming told council members that they should demand a 50-50 split on any revenue that is above the 6.7% investment return that is projected for AEG.

Consultants for the city have responded by arguing that AEG’s financial return is too low to allow for "revenue sharing" agreements. AEG executives agreed but noted in a recent hearing that the company expects a "substantial" profit from the stadium.

http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/lanow/2011/08/nfl-stadium-los-angeles.html

Next Step: Completion of the EIR (Hopefully done by Spring 2012)

losangelino

August 10th, 2011, 08:51 AM

Leiweke Hopes to Break Ground on Stadium by June

With Council Approval, Football Project Moves to Designs and Sacramento Deal-making
by Jon Regardie, Executive Editor
Published: Tuesday, August 9, 2011 4:48 PM PDT
DOWNTOWN LOS ANGELES — A lot could go wrong in the next 10 months, but if everything goes right, Anschutz Entertainment Group will break ground on the Downtown football stadium/convention center expansion on June 1, 2012.

That was what AEG President and CEO Tim Leiweke said this afternoon following the City Council’s unanimous vote to approve a non-binding memorandum of understanding on the deal between the city and the developer.

The council’s 12-0 vote marked a significant, if not defining point, in AEG’s effort to erect a $1.1 billion, 64,000-square-foot stadium where the site of the Convention Center’s West Hall now stands. The deal calls for the West Hall to be razed and replaced with a new hall contiguous to the main convention building.

The agreement with the council calls for the city to float $275 million in bonds. Nearly three quarters of that would be covered by AEG, with the remainder coming from revenues generated by the project.

“No one thought we’d get this far,” Leiweke stated. “Here we are today.”

Leiweke previously said that AEG has been meeting regularly with the NFL and has had conversations with about a half dozen teams regarding moving to Los Angeles. Today, he said that he expects a team will be playing here in a temporary facility — either the Rose Bowl or the Coliseum — within two years, but possibly sooner. Franchises including the San Diego Chargers, Jacksonville Jaguars and Buffalo Bills are seen as the most likely candidates to come west.

In any deal, Leiweke said, Phil Anschutz would have partial ownership of the franchise. He said the deal does not work financially without that.

Leiweke said an announcement about a franchise in Los Angeles would not occur until, at the soonest, the end of the upcoming NFL season. Although an environmental impact report is expected to be completed early next year and the city and AEG could sign a binding deal soon after, Leiweke said no construction will occur until there is an agreement with a franchise.

“We’re not going to push dirt until we have a team in place,” he said.

Leiweke classified the council vote as a game changer, predicting that it would transform Los Angeles from a city pursuing a franchise to a location desired by multiple teams. Despite his enthusiasm, the league has not publicly endorsed the Downtown stadium proposal, and has also talked openly about a competing plan in the City of Industry being propelled by Ed Roski, who was Phil Anschutz’s partner in Staples Center.

Leiweke said the focus now shifts to multiple fronts, including creating designs. AEG has hired Gensler to be the architect for Farmers Field, while Populous will handle the convention work; the convention replacement would be the first element of the project to break ground.

Additionally, he said the company is working with lawmakers in Sacramento regarding challenges to the project. An unlikely opponent to the stadium has come in the form of Texas businessman Billy Bob Barnett, who convinced some state lawmakers to introduce legislation that could be a hurdle to the project. Barnett has had conflicts with AEG in that state.

AEG, said, Leiweke, needs “some protection from the crazies.”

Leiweke said AEG intends to do a full environmental impact report and is not seeking an exemption from California Environmental Quality Act standards. Instead, he said, the discussions with state lawmakers are intended to “make sure people can’t stop this project with a frivolous lawsuit.”

Leiweke said that AEG has spent about $15 million on the project. In June, he said that the company expects to spend $45 million on the effort by next spring.

Contact Jon Regardie at regardie@downtownnews.com.

saiholmes

August 14th, 2011, 04:34 PM

Ed Roski and the other Los Angeles NFL stadium idea
It's easy to forget about billionaire Ed Roski's idea for an NFL stadium in Industry with the bright lights firmly fixed on another billionaire, Philip Anschutz, and his sexy downtown proposal.
Los Angeles Times
August 12, 2011|Bill Dwyre

The big headlines and media noise swirling around the proposed downtown stadium have given new life to the nearly forgotten concept that the NFL might have a team in Los Angeles again.

One thing is certain. Tim Leiweke and his Anschutz Entertainment Group have won the battle of perception. The only way Leiweke could have made a bigger splash would have been to don a Paul Revere hat and ride through the streets of Los Angeles, yelling: "The NFL is coming! The NFL is coming!"

The implication of his proposed site, next to Staples Center, is that it would make L.A. Live even livelier. It is a sexy place after years of being a no-man's land.

Want some action? Come see an NFL game and stay that night to see Kobe. Hungry? Have Wolfgang Puck rustle up dinner. Make it an overnight? No Motel 6's here. Hand your platinum card to the J.W. Marriott. ESPN is here, too, zoned for food and for dishing out scoops of media self-importance.

It is a sort of Disneyland, a place to be for those who need a place to be.

Now, after years of nothing happening on the NFL front, this deal seems inevitable. The NFL has finished its labor problems. All parties — other than the long-forgotten and long-suffering retired players — seem happy. And the NFL has indicated it will now focus on Los Angeles.

You can chalk it up. Leiweke will build it downtown, and they will come. It is done.

Interestingly, there remains a quiet dissenter 20 miles or so to the east. Think of Ed Roski as a man in waiting.

Roski is the billionaire from Industry who has his own stadium proposal. Oh, yes. Remember him?

He is 72 and looks 52. He climbs mountains and rides bicycles all around countries the size of Ireland. He lives next to the golf course at Lakeside Country Club in Toluca Lake, is a member, and never plays golf.

"I love the game, love to watch it on TV," he says. "I just never started to play, and now it's too late."

He is a real estate executive, the head of Majestic Realty, who counts among his friends the man who is financing Leiweke's Paul Revere rides around downtown.

"Phil Anschutz has been a tremendous asset to Southern California," Roski says. "We talk to each other all the time."

Were Roski a reporter, he'd never get to talk to Anschutz, but that's a story for another day.

Roski and Anschutz are the strangest of competitors. They started doing deals together more than 30 years ago when Anschutz, then a newly rich Denver oilman, called about a parcel of land near Union Station and both chatted about the need for a new stadium in the Los Angeles area. Now Roski owns a piece of Anschutz's Staples Center and has ownership pieces, as does Anschutz, in Jerry Buss's Lakers. Roski also has a piece of Anschutz's ownership of the Kings.

A bitter rivalry for the NFL's hand in marriage this is not.

"If the downtown site wins," Roski says, "the first thing is that I will be happy the city got a team. It's one of those things where I don't care if it is in my backyard or your backyard — let's just get a team back."

That being said, Roski thinks his stadium concept, on his own 600-acre plot of land where the 57 and 60 freeways meet near the cities of Industry, Walnut and Diamond Bar, is the best one. He says his wide-open spaces provide outside parking that creates what he calls "the fan experience." He says that, more than anything else, drives the NFL.

He wrinkles his nose at the thought of tailgate parties in parking structures, which is where the downtown site would stash most of its fans.

"You want it outside, with big tents and room for parties, even room for things to do after the games," Roski says. "This is Southern California. We have the weather."

In true real-estate vernacular, Roski says this is all about "location, location, location." He points to a huge map on the wall that shows L.A., Riverside, San Bernardino and Orange Counties — with his stadium site near the center. His implication was that this would be a truly Los Angeles-area team, giving fans from all over a chance to attend.

Roski says all his work is done, all the environmental action has been taken, no bonds need to be floated, no communities are objecting. He said the NFL does not allow owners to have ownership of casinos, and if he got a team, he would give his Las Vegas Silverton to his children. He says he released his architect, for the moment, to do other work "because it is work, and I won't take that away from people." And he said he hasn't acquired naming rights for his stadium, unlike Leiweke did with his lucrative deal with Farmers Insurance, because "it makes more sense to do that once you have a team."

Roski says: "We could put a shovel in the ground tomorrow."

Also a dagger in the heart of Phil Anschutz.

You gotta love Los Angeles' dueling billionaires. The NFL certainly should.

Read More: http://articles.latimes.com/2011/aug/12/sports/la-sp-dwyre-ed-roski-20110813

saiholmes

August 15th, 2011, 03:58 AM

5p6c9HGzDag

milquetoast

August 17th, 2011, 09:51 AM

AEG'S DESIGNS ON DOWNTOWN STADIUM http://i231.photobucket.com/albums/ee192/trolltoast/album%203/37387647c7174ee9ce443a1e281b4134fc.jpg . IS A DOSE OF ARCHITECTURAL VISION ON AEG'S PART ASKING TOO MUCH? . http://i231.photobucket.com/albums/ee192/trolltoast/album%203/villaraigosa-202x-large.jpg Oh, yessssssss! . Let's assume AEG manages to build a massive football stadium and event center in downtown Los Angeles, an outcome looking increasingly likely following a unanimous City Council vote last week in support of the project. What would the arrival of $1.2-billion, 72,000-seat Farmers Field mean for downtown and its role in the larger region? For the city's architectural reputation? For the state of the urban mega-project in an age of austerity? We've gotten some tantalizing clues in recent weeks, though not from Anschutz Entertainment Group itself. . The company has been aggressively mum about the progress of the Farmers Field design, as has its architect, Gensler, an increasingly busy firm that was known for decades as an interiors specialist. Instead, the details have come buried in the news of two other design firms hired by AEG and the city to work outside the stadium proper. What those clues add up to is this: The arrival of the stadium would give downtown another push toward true centrality in Los Angeles, or at least help make it first among equals when it comes to the city's many centers. But the impact on its immediate neighborhood, the South Park section of downtown, promises to be a whole lot less positive. Or, to be precise, a whole lot more of the same. . http://i231.photobucket.com/albums/ee192/trolltoast/album%203/farmers.jpg Can you say "tiny?" . In fact, if there's one thing we can count on — given AEG's architectural track record — it is that Farmers Field promises to expand, in seamless fashion, the reach and impressive scale of AEG-land, that sleek, glossy commercial oasis between South Park proper and the Harbor Freeway. . The rather sketchy preliminary designs so far released by AEG show a stadium draped in a silvery, translucent exterior that dutifully matches the palette of Staples Center and L.A. Live and is shoehorned into a 15-acre site replacing the West Hall of the Los Angeles Convention Center. By NFL standards that's a postage stamp-sized piece of real estate. That shoehorning itself isn't the problem. Trying to fit an NFL facility into a constricted urban site without room for tailgating could make Farmers Field the football equivalent of the wildly popular new generation of downtown baseball parks: A fascinating experiment in bringing the sport back to the city after decades of suburban and edge-city exile. . http://i231.photobucket.com/albums/ee192/trolltoast/album%203/famersatnight.jpg . The problem is that because this is an AEG project, the stadium's most obvious architectural fealty is not to the city but to the corporate mini-world around it. That's not to say that AEG has been entirely deaf to complaints about the placeless quality of the architecture it has already built downtown. . At the urging of the city's Planning Department and Planning Commission, it has enlisted Gehl Architects, a Danish firm that is known for intelligent streetscape design and has recently completed a sophisticated proposal to remake a stretch of Figueroa Street downtown. The involvement of Gehl's Oliver Schulze in the stadium planning process is a very good sign. Let's hope he is able to have a real effect on the streetscape plans around the stadium as the project moves ahead. . Other news from AEG has been less positive. . To build a replacement facility along Pico Boulevard for the demolished West Hall, AEG and the city together showed limited imagination in picking the firm Populous — formerly known as HOK Sport — earlier this summer. One of Populous' recently hired architects, Dan Meis, was a chief designer of Staples Center, which would seem to increase the odds that the new convention center building won't deviate much from the shiny AEG template. Oddly enough, Meis was also a lead architect on a football stadium proposal in City of Industry that has been pushed by developer Ed Roski as the chief rival to the AEG plan. . Left unanswered so far, as AEG continues to keep the architects at Gensler away from the media, are a number of key questions about how the project will relate to the neighborhood and city around it. . One is simply whether Gensler has advanced the design in any substantial way in recent months — or has merely been idling as AEG worked to pin down approval on the political front. Another is how AEG plans to treat the design of the two sizable parking structures that may rise between the stadium and the freeway. . http://i231.photobucket.com/albums/ee192/trolltoast/album%203/la_e_FarmersField1_600.jpg . The stadium is one of two mega-projects in the works downtown. The other is a redesigned Union Station, set to be enlarged to make room for the arrival of high-speed rail service. L.A. County's Metropolitan Transportation Authority, which bought Union Station earlier this year for $75 million, is planning to release a short list of design teams for that project in October. . Los Angeles is thus poised to create a pair of major downtown gateways: Farmers Field and an updated convention center on its southern edge and a remade Union Station to the northeast. In an ideal world, City Hall would seize on this double opportunity and insist on — or at least do what it can to promote — ambitious architecture at each location. But that would require that the builders of each facility take a leap of architectural faith. I'm willing at least for now to keep an open mind about Metro's plans for Union Station, which are in their earliest stages. Farmers Field, on the other hand, shows few indications that it will be anything but a smooth and compliant — if huge — complement to L.A. Live and Staples Center. . After a brief moment of optimism about ambitious civic architecture in Los Angeles following the triumphant opening of Frank Gehry's Walt Disney Concert Hall in 2003, it appears the city could revert to its status as a place where the most talented local architects struggle to get any sizable hometown commissions, and where the most expensive projects tend to be among the most architecturally conservative. Given the state of the economy, Farmers Field and the Union Station expansion — along with Eli Broad's museum on Bunker Hill — may be among a small number of large-scale projects to be completed in the next several years in Southern California. . That fact and the sheer scale of the stadium promise to give Farmers Field outsize impact, particularly when it comes to the urban character of downtown Los Angeles. AEG has said it hopes to break ground on the stadium next June. That means there's not much time left to turn its design prospects around. . christopher.hawthorne@latimes.com CHRISTOPHER HAWTHORNE LOSANGELESTIMES

saiholmes

August 28th, 2011, 06:11 AM

Tim Leiweke seeks lawsuit protection
By Arash Markazi
ESPNLosAngeles.com
Updated: August 26, 2011, 10:58 PM ET

LOS ANGELES -- Plans to build an NFL stadium in downtown Los Angeles could be delayed or completely derailed if state lawmakers don't introduce special legislation in the next two weeks that would protect the developers from frivolous lawsuits, AEG president and CEO Tim Leiweke told a state Senate panel Friday.

"We've made it very clear that we will not move forward without this," Leiweke said. "We cannot and will not move forward with this project with that uncertainty hanging over our head because the NFL will not commit to Farmers Field with that uncertainty hanging over our head."

Earlier this month the Los Angeles city council unanimously passed the financial framework of an agreement between AEG and the city to build Farmers Field, a $1.2 billion football stadium in downtown Los Angeles which would be attached to a new $275 million wing of the Los Angeles Convention Center.

Leiweke said he expects Majestic Realty, which has a rival stadium proposal in the City of Industry, will file a lawsuit in an attempt to stop the downtown project. He also claimed John Semcken, vice president at Majestic and its stadium plan's point man, was with lobbyists in Sacramento recently urging legislators not to pass any law that would help Farmers Field avoid litigation.

What NFL team might bolt its current location for the City of Angels? Arash Markazi breaks it down. Story

"Clearly John Semcken sees this as an opportunity to stop our project," Leiweke said. "We've had feedback from senators and assemblymen that met with them and they've questioned our character and me personally and they've questioned whether we really built and developed Staples Center and L.A. Live. This has led me to believe, without a question in my mind, that people that go around and question character are people that will litigate. They spent the week in Sacramento and I think they did themselves a disservice because almost everyone that came back to us was shocked at how they trashed us."

Semcken didn't deny he was in Sacramento speaking to legislators but said he and Majestic have no plans on filing a lawsuit to stop the downtown stadium project. "In over 70 years Majestic Realty has never sued a competitor and has no plans to sue a business partner," Semcken said. "We are 100 percent committed to returning the NFL to our region and have shown the league and the teams the tremendous economic upside of our project."

Ed Roski, who owns Majestic Realty, helped build Staples Center with Philip Anschutz and also owns a piece of the Lakers and Kings with Anschutz. He has said if AEG gets a team and is in position to build Farmers Field he would not stand in the way.

Leiweke has said the same thing about Roski's project, which has been "shovel-ready" for two years after Roski secured an exemption to the California Environmental Quality Act by the state Senate in 2009. The ruling exempts the Industry project from state environmental laws and protects it from environmental lawsuits. Legislators were roundly criticized for passing the exemption, making it impossible for AEG to secure a similar deal, leaving Leiweke to figure out alternative ways to expedite possible litigation.

"We are not going to get into a war of words. I hold Ed in too high a regard for that," Leiweke said. "If their project gets done and they get a team and push dirt, we are committed to getting out of the way and if we get our project done my guess is Ed is not going to build a second stadium."

Roski was able to gain support for his exemption by promising jobs and an NFL team if it was granted but two years later the 600-acre site is still empty and there is no NFL team, leaving plenty of skeptics in Sacramento. But with California's unemployment rate at 12 percent, the second-highest of any state in July, there could be some traction to help a project that developers claim will create 18,000 temporary and permanent living-wage and union jobs.

Leiweke wasn't exactly sure what measure could be introduced and passed before the Sept. 9 deadline for action on bills but had previously told ESPNLosAngeles.com he was hoping challenges would get sent to an arbitrator and resolved in three months rather than be subjected to a potentially lengthy lawsuit.

"We will do a full environmental impact report but there are crazy people out there that will come along and try to stop this project by suing us and taking us to court," Leiweke said. "We just want a binding arbitration with a three-person commission appointed by the political leaders with a voice from the environmentalists that can hear these complaints. We have committed to making this the most environmentally friendly stadium ever built."

If AEG is unable to get a measure passed next month, they could put a hold on design and environmental work currently being conducted at a cost of $50 million in the hopes of breaking ground on the project by June 2012.

"If we are unsuccessful it will be a blow to the project and we would have to evaluate what to do going forward," said Ted Fikre, chief legal and development officer for AEG. "There is a significant investment of capital that's required for us to continue to progress this project at its current pace, as much as $50 million between now and next summer. We view this as a critical measure and one we are hopeful to get to keep moving on that schedule."

Friday's public hearing by the Senate Select Committee on Sports and Entertainment to examine the project and whether legislation is necessary began with testimony from former New York Giants defensive end Michael Strahan, who told the senators they should do whatever is necessary to bring the NFL back to Los Angeles.

"L.A. is the city the NFL wants to come back to and everyone knows that," Strahan said. "I've had talks with [NFL commissioner] Roger Goodell and I've blatantly asked him when is L.A. getting a team, it's time and he doesn't disagree and AEG is the partner the NFL needs to bring football back to L.A."

Leiweke believes AEG can only partner with the NFL if AEG can prove to the league that the project is on track and won't be stalled or stopped by litigation. If lawmakers can't provide AEG with that protection and security, Leiweke doesn't believe it will be possible to secure a team and continue with the project.

"If this project can be delayed for two years, no team and no league is going to make a commitment while we try to work through the legal process," Leiweke said. "That's the last major point we have to overcome with the NFL and teams to get them to come to L.A. We have to show them certainty. No one is going to come to L.A. if they're going to face two years' worth of litigation."

Read More: http://espn.go.com/los-angeles/nfl/story/_/id/6900222/aeg-wants-legal-protection-la-stadium-plan

Birianon

September 2nd, 2011, 01:53 PM

Sen. Alex Padilla takes lead on football stadium bill
September 1, 2011 | 7:15 pm 021State Sen. Alex Padilla (D-Pacoima) said late Thursday that he will be the author of SB 292, the long-anticipated legislation that would restrict legal challenges to a football stadium project proposed in downtown Los Angeles.

The bill, which will be gutted of its current language on community colleges, is on the Assembly floor and ready for action, but Padilla promised it will go through public hearings.

“I fully expect it will have committee reviews,'' Padilla said, adding that he worked on the bill with Assembly Speaker John Pérez (D-Los Angeles).

Other legislative officials said the measure will require any lawsuit challenging the stadium’s environmental review to go directly to the California Court of Appeal, bypassing the Superior Court, and a decision would have to be made by the court in 150 to 175 days.

Assemblyman Bob Blumenfield (D-Woodland Hills), a negotiator on the bill, said the proposal is “much more balanced” in protecting the environment than what the Legislature approved two years ago for a competing stadium proposed in the City of Industry.

“There will be no exemption from our environmental laws,’’ Blumenfield said. “I would not support that. Under expedited judicial review, we can bring jobs to this community while building a carbon-neutral stadium that will prioritize transit more than any other NFL stadium.”

Anschutz Entertainment Group is promising to adopt measures to make sure the stadium has a 10% better rate of public transit use than any other football stadium in the country.

Padilla and Pérez plan to outline more details of the legislation at a Capitol media briefing Friday morning.

http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/lanow/2011/09/sen-alex-padilla-downtown-stadium.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+lanowblog+%28L.A.+Now%29

klamedia

September 2nd, 2011, 06:37 PM

http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/lanow/2011/09/sen-alex-padilla-downtown-stadium.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+lanowblog+%28L.A.+Now%29

How we have evolved. Carbon neutral stadium. 10% better transit usage than any other stadium in the country. Whether or not any of this comes to fruition remains to be seen but we in Los Angeles are having serious discussion about transit usage! This is a testament as to how far our fledgling transit system has come in the past 20 years. Also the anti-transit/density folks have shot themselves in the foot by opposing every new development screaming "traffic traffic" has put an enormous amount of weight on public transit to become better connected as an alternative to traffic and has highlighted the importance of pt in LA if LA is to stay competitive and global. Thanks NIMBY's!

pesto

September 3rd, 2011, 05:33 PM

What can I say? "You play to your long hand". "The last refuge of the scoundrel is patriotism." You find the expression.

AEG can't very well claim "no traffic effect downtown". So the recourse is to make themselves sound heroic for talking-up transit and blame the fans if they insanely choose to drive instead. They also talk about job creation and ripple effects and stand next to union leaders whenever possible. Wait for the cute pictures of toddlers holding footballs and baby shovels. This is just PR 101. I wouldn't expect anything less.

Conversely, they don't seem eager to face lawsuits from possible offended parties. Do you think they wouldn't have just as quickly have gone for a total exemption from all laws if they thought they could have gotten that through? They're just pushing all the buttons they think might work.

saiholmes

September 3rd, 2011, 05:39 PM

Farmers Field looks to avoid litigation
By Arash Markazi
ESPNLosAngeles.com
Updated: September 2, 2011, 6:19 PM ET

State lawmakers introduced legislation Friday that would expedite legal challenges to Farmers Field, Anschutz Entertainment Group's $1.2 billion proposed football stadium in downtown Los Angeles.

Assembly Speaker John A. Pérez and Senator Alex Padilla, who authored the bill, introduced the legislation one week before the Sept. 9 deadline for action on bills when Sacramento lawmakers will break for recess.

"This bill has the support of legislators from both houses and both parties," Padilla said. "It would pave the way for the most environmentally friendly sports stadium in the country in addition to putting thousands of people to work. The bill is a culmination of many weeks of discussions that will allow a thorough and expeditious judicial review of the Los Angeles Convention Center and events center project upon completion of a full (environmental impact review). There are a number of reasons I am authoring the bill but three most important are jobs, jobs and jobs."

Last week AEG president and CEO Tim Leiweke told a state Senate panel in Los Angeles that plans for the stadium would stop if state lawmakers didn't introduce special legislation that would protect AEG from frivolous lawsuits under the California Environmental Quality Act.

"We've made it very clear that we will not move forward without this," Leiweke said. "We cannot and will not move forward with this project with that uncertainty hanging over our head because the NFL will not commit to Farmers Field with that uncertainty hanging over our head."

The bill, which was still being drafted late Thursday night, would allow legal challenges to the stadium's environmental impact report to be heard immediately in the California Court of Appeal, which would then come to a decision within 175 days. The expedited process would bypass the Superior Court and avoid the protracted litigation AEG has been fearful of.

In exchange, AEG has pledged to build a carbon-neutral stadium with more public transit users than any other stadium in the country and have committed to making Farmers Field one of the only stadiums in the country to have a net zero carbon footprint.

The six-month time period for possible lawsuits is twice as long as what Leiweke initially proposed. The current proposal, however, is thought to be more acceptable to legislators who believe anything less than five months would be unrealistic, considering the project's environmental impact report is expected to exceed 10,000 pages.

Leiweke has continually promised lawmakers AEG would complete the most extensive environmental review in the history of downtown Los Angeles.

A competing stadium proposal in the City of Industry has been "shovel-ready" for two years after developer Ed Roski secured an exemption to the California Environmental Quality Act in 2009. The ruling exempts the Industry project from state environmental laws and protects it from environmental lawsuits. Legislators were roundly criticized for passing the exemption, making it virtually impossible for AEG to secure a similar deal for their stadium proposal.

"We are not asking for an exemption," Leiweke said. "We are going to do a full EIR. It will be the best EIR ever done in downtown Los Angeles and we are halfway through it. We are committed to building the most environmentally friendly stadium ever built."

Although the bill seems to have the support of most legislators in Los Angeles, the real battle will be convincing lawmakers to the north and south, which will not be easy considering the two teams most commonly linked to a move to Los Angeles if the stadium is built are the San Diego Chargers and Oakland Raiders. The San Francisco 49ers, currently trying to secure financing for a new stadium, have also been mentioned.

With the NFL unwilling to expand its 32-team league anytime soon and with San Diego, Oakland and San Francisco playing in the three oldest stadiums in the league, it is highly likely Los Angeles' next NFL team will come from their neighbors to the north or south, which will be on the mind of some lawmakers who don't want to use public funds to finance a stadium in their backyard but also don't want to lose their team to a privately financed stadium in Los Angeles.

"It will not be the legislature who determines what teams comes to Los Angeles," Padilla said. "It will not be the governor, it will not be city hall, it will not be the mayor. Only the NFL owners will determine which team relocates to Los Angeles. The opportunity for us is to present a viable option and one with tremendous economic benefit for consideration to the NFL."

Not only could the bill face opposition from lawmakers in San Diego, Oakland and San Francisco, but the proposed legislation has also been roundly criticized by environmentalists, many of whom are skeptical of the stadium's transportation plans which claim Farmers Field will have the lowest "cars per football game ticket holder" ratio in the country.

"Bringing an NFL stadium and football team to L.A. will create new jobs and boost the local economy, but it cannot be done at the expense of downtown residents and monstrous traffic jams in Los Angeles," said David Pettit, senior attorney with the Natural Resources Defense Council in a statement. "Members of the California Legislature propose to give AEG special treatment in return for things that AEG would need to do anyway. This weak, last-minute, back-room deal is a missed opportunity for Los Angeles and a dangerous precedent for California. It can and should be fixed."

Pettit offered to work with AEG to bring an NFL team to an environmentally friendly stadium. "But this current proposal does not deliver on that promise," he concluded. Roski was able to gain support for his exemption by promising jobs and an NFL team if it was granted, but two years later his 600-acre site in Industry is still empty. But with California's unemployment rate at 12 percent, the second-highest of any state in July, there could be some traction to help a project that developers claim will create 18,000 temporary and permanent living-wage and union jobs.

Leiweke has said AEG would like to break ground on the stadium and convention center expansion by June 1, which would still be possible under the current timetable in the proposed bill if the environmental impact report is completed by January and AEG successfully resolves any legal challenges within six months.

Leiweke said he expects Roski's Majestic Realty group will file or back a lawsuit in an attempt to stop the downtown project. He also claimed John Semcken, vice president at Majestic and its stadium plan's point man, was with lobbyists in Sacramento recently urging legislators not to pass any law that would help Farmers Field avoid litigation.

"They spent the week in Sacramento and I think they did themselves a disservice because almost everyone that came back to us was shocked at how they trashed us," Leiweke said last week.

Semcken didn't deny he was in Sacramento speaking to legislators but said he and Majestic have no plans to file a lawsuit to stop the downtown stadium project.

"In over 70 years Majestic Realty has never sued a competitor and has no plans to sue a business partner," Semcken said. "We are 100 percent committed to returning the NFL to our region and have shown the league and the teams the tremendous economic upside of our project."

Roski, who is the president and chairman of Majestic Realty, helped build Staples Center with Philip Anschutz and also owns a piece of the Lakers and Kings with Anschutz. He has said if AEG gets a team and is in position to build Farmers Field he would not stand in the way.

Padilla and Perez seemed optimistic their bill would get the necessary support it needs from lawmakers next week to allow plans for Farmers Field to move forward.

"This goes above and beyond what is normally a part of an EIR process," said Perez. "This is an unprecedented bill on all marks. It preserves the environmental standards, it strengthens the mitigation and it doesn't limit anybody's ability to avail themselves of the judicial process. It just shortens the timeline so that everybody achieves greater certainty in terms of the outcome."

Read More: http://espn.go.com/los-angeles/nfl/story/_/id/6922972/legislation-put-forth-limit-farmers-field-challenges

klamedia

September 4th, 2011, 06:18 PM

milquetoast

September 5th, 2011, 09:15 AM

Trying to thwart environmental regulations while stating that they're only doing it for the children while holding a baby....how Tea Party of AEG.

There's a baby involved?

saiholmes

September 9th, 2011, 04:17 AM

Farmers Field plan can be expedited
By Arash Markazi
ESPNLosAngeles.com
Wednesday, September 7, 2011

A bill to expedite legal challenges to Farmers Field, Anschutz Entertainment Group's $1.2 billion proposed football stadium in downtown Los Angeles, passed the California State Assembly with overwhelming bipartisan support on Wednesday.

Senate Bill 292, which passed 59-13, will next be heard by the full Senate which will vote on it before Friday's deadline for action on bills when Sacramento lawmakers will break for recess.

"Farmers Field will be the most far-reaching environmentally friendly stadium in the United States," said assembly speaker John A. Pérez. "This bill requires that the percentage of attendees arriving at stadium events by public transit and other non-vehicle means will be 10 percent better than any other NFL stadium in the country."

Senator Alex Padilla, who authored the bill, introduced the legislation last week and on Tuesday spoke to the California State Assembly Committee on Natural Resources, which voted 5-1 in favor of the bill, and later to the California State Assembly Committee on Appropriations, which voted 12-1 in favor of the bill.

"I think we've crafted a bill in a well-balanced way and we're not compromising any California environmental laws," Padilla said. "There is no public subsidy here. There is someone in Los Angeles willing to put over $1 billion of their own money in this proposal. If it is approved and the NFL decides to move a team here it will put 10,000 people at work during construction alone. Once that's done and the convention center is done there is another 10,000 permanent jobs on the tail end of that. This opportunity is huge."

The bill, which includes no exemption from environmental laws, would allow legal challenges to the stadium's environmental impact report to be heard immediately in the California Court of Appeal, which would then come to a decision within 175 days. The expedited process would bypass the Superior Court and avoid the protracted litigation AEG has been fearful of.

In exchange, AEG has pledged to build a carbon-neutral stadium with more public transit users than any other stadium in the country and has committed to making Farmers Field one of the only stadiums in the country to have a net-zero carbon footprint.

The Natural Resources Defense Council and the California League of Conservation Voters on Tuesday also backed the bill after initially raising concerns.

After the bill was introduced on Friday, David Pettit, senior attorney with the Natural Resources Defense Council, issued a pointed statement, calling the bill a "weak, last-minute, back-room deal" and a "missed opportunity for Los Angeles and a dangerous precedent for California" that "can and should be fixed."

On Tuesday, Pettit, after meeting with assembly speaker John A. Pérez and Padilla, praised the project as he stood in front of the California State Assembly Committee on Natural Resources and supported the bill along with Warner Chabot, CEO of the California League of Conservation Voters.

"We are totally on the same page now," Pettit said. "I think this is a great project, it's in the perfect location and you'll be able to take public transit. I was a Rams fan as a kid and I can't wait to have football back in Los Angeles. I made some very critical remarks about the first draft of the bill that I have taken a lot of heat for but I've worked closely with the speaker's office in innumerable calls and meetings and I think now we're at a place that's way better than we first started."

Pettit said he came around to supporting the bill after convincing Perez and Padilla to adjust a few aspects of it, which would make it more acceptable to environmentalists and politicians alike.

"There were discussions all through the holiday weekend and there were three main things we wanted that I had been critical of in the past and we got commitments on all three of them," said Pettit, who was still working on the new provisions in the bill moments before endorsing it. "We got stronger mitigation, we got longer-lasting mitigation for the life of the project, not just for the first 10 years, and we got rid of the opt-out provision. There were these opt-out provisions in the bill where AEG could take their ball and go home if they thought they were going to lose in court.

"They could opt out and go back to the normal process and go to the Superior Court. If they did that they weren't bound by the special protections they agreed to in the bill. That had to come out and it is now gone."

A competing stadium proposal in the City of Industry has been "shovel-ready" for two years after developer Ed Roski secured an exemption to the California Environmental Quality Act in 2009. The ruling exempts the Industry project from state environmental laws and protects it from environmental lawsuits. Legislators were roundly criticized for passing the exemption, making it virtually impossible for AEG to secure a similar deal for their stadium proposal.

"We are not asking for an exemption," AEG president and CEO Tim Leiweke said. "We are going to do a full EIR. It will be the best EIR ever done in downtown Los Angeles and we are halfway through it. We are committed to building the most environmentally friendly stadium ever built."

Although the bill seems to have the support of most legislators in Los Angeles, the real battle will be convincing lawmakers to the north and south, which will not be easy considering the two teams most commonly linked to a move to Los Angeles if the stadium is built are the San Diego Chargers and Oakland Raiders. The San Francisco 49ers, currently trying to secure financing for a new stadium, have also been mentioned.

The topic came up during the California State Assembly Committee on Natural Resources hearing when assembly member Jared Huffman, whose district represents Marin County and Sonoma County in Northern California, was more interested in including provisions that would prevent the proposed stadium from being the future home of a current NFL team in California than any environmental laws.

"My concern is if one of the existing franchises in another part of California is the one that picks up sticks and moves to this wonderful new stadium, it's probably fair to say then we are not creating new jobs in California, we are just relocating jobs," Huffman said. "If you wanted to put us at ease, those of us who are not LA-centric in our NFL support, it would be possible to have a provision that says none of this happens if it's a California franchise. ... I'm not sure why that's an unreasonable condition."

Padilla said the bill was not intended to dictate which NFL team can or can't come to Los Angeles and it would be wrong for lawmakers to put such restrictions on a city and a privately financed project which would create thousands of new jobs.

With the NFL unwilling to expand its 32-team league anytime soon and with San Diego, Oakland and San Francisco playing in the three oldest stadiums in the league, it is highly likely Los Angeles' next NFL team would come from their neighbors to the north or south. This is not lost on many lawmakers in San Diego, Oakland and San Francisco who don't want to use public funds to finance a new stadium in their backyard but also don't want to lose their team to a privately financed stadium in Los Angeles.

"This has been a hurdle since Friday but we continue to remind everyone that only the NFL decides which teams will move where," Padilla said. "That's not our role here. It's important to remember that unlike other sports stadium and arena conversations we've heard of, this project is completely privately financed. Those legislators in San Diego, Oakland and San Francisco should work with their local partners to try to find a private investment facility of their own but thus far we haven't heard that from them."

Read More: http://espn.go.com/los-angeles/nfl/story/_/id/6941768/assembly-votes-expedite-farmers-field-plan

saiholmes

September 10th, 2011, 03:45 AM

Farmers Field passes another hurdle
By Arash Markazi
ESPNLosAngeles.com
Updated: September 9, 2011, 6:14 PM ET

In a decision that could pave the way for the NFL to return to Los Angeles next year, the California State Senate passed a bill to expedite legal challenges to Farmers Field, Anschutz Entertainment Group's $1.2 billion proposed football stadium in downtown Los Angeles.

Senate Bill 292, which passed 32-7, will now go to California Gov. Jerry Brown, who has 30 days to either sign or veto the bill. He is expected to sign it but if he takes no action, the bill will become law anyway. Lt. Gov. Gavin Newsom announced his support for the bipartisan bill on Thursday.

Friday's decision represents the biggest milestone for the NFL's return to Los Angeles since the city council unanimously passed the financial framework of an agreement between AEG and the city last month to build the 72,000-seat stadium and a new $275 million wing of the Los Angeles Convention Center next to Staples Center and L.A. Live, also owned by AEG.

AEG president and CEO Tim Leiweke said plans for Farmers Field could not have continued unless the bill was passed. He said he expected Majestic Realty, which has a rival stadium proposal in the City of Industry, to file or back a lawsuit in an attempt to stop the downtown project by tying it up in litigation for years.

Ed Roski, president and chairman of Majestic Realty, helped build Staples Center with Philip Anschutz and also owns a piece of the Lakers and Kings with Anschutz. Roski was able to secure an exemption to the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) by the state Senate in 2009 for his project. The ruling exempts the Industry project from state environmental laws and protects it from environmental lawsuits. Legislators were roundly criticized for passing the exemption, making it impossible for AEG to secure a similar deal.

AEG's bill includes no exemption from environmental laws and would allow legal challenges to the stadium's environmental impact report (EIR) to be heard immediately in the California Court of Appeal, which would then come to a decision within 175 days. The expedited process would bypass the Superior Court and avoid the protracted litigation AEG has been fearful of.

In exchange, AEG has pledged to build a carbon-neutral stadium with more public transit users than any other stadium in the country and has committed to making Farmers Field one of the only stadiums in the country to have a net-zero carbon footprint.

"This is not an exemption," Leiweke said. "We are going to do a full EIR. It will be the best EIR ever done in downtown Los Angeles and we are halfway through it. We are committed to building the most environmentally friendly stadium ever built."

AEG's bill actually inspired a landmark day in the Senate as state lawmakers also passed AB 900, a bill modeled on SB 292 and introduced less than 24 hours before it was voted on, which would allow a variety of statewide big-ticket projects such as stadiums and arenas to apply to the governor for similar expedited legal challenges while also holding them to the same strict environmental measures. Both bills received overwhelming bipartisan support because California's unemployment rate is currently at 12 percent, the second-highest of any state, and fast-tracking construction on proposed stadiums and arenas has the potential to create thousands of much-needed jobs in the state.

The ruling will now allow AEG to continue with design and environmental work currently being done at a cost of $50 million, in the hopes of breaking ground on the project by June 2012. If AEG is able to clear all environmental and legal challenges by May, an NFL team will likely announce plans to relocate to Los Angeles and play in either the Coliseum or the Rose Bowl until Farmers Field is completed.

If environmental and legal challenges drag into July when NFL teams begin training camp, a team likely wouldn't relocate until 2013 and construction would not begin until February 2013. AEG's agreement with the city states construction on the project cannot begin until an NFL team has signed a long-term lease to play in Los Angeles. AEG is hoping to begin construction on the project in June 2012 with Farmers Field opening in September 2016, but is prepared to push that schedule back one year if needed.

"If we can get through the EIR and we think we will by May and if we can have certainty that if there are challenges that they will be dealt with in a reasonable period of time, I believe somewhere between the end of the Super Bowl in 2012 to the end of the Super Bowl in 2013 we are going to be able to prove to the NFL and to a team that we are now ready to go," Leiweke said. "We have cleared all the legal challenges, the environmental challenges, the financing challenges and we have a definitive agreement with the city of Los Angeles. That means we can play football at Farmers Field hopefully no later than 2016, but we are prepared to go to 2017 if we have to."

The team most commonly linked to moving to Los Angeles is the San Diego Chargers, who began as the Los Angeles Chargers playing at the Coliseum in 1960. They have tried unsuccessfully for nearly a decade to get a new venue to replace 45-year-old Qualcomm Stadium. The Chargers can announce their intentions to leave San Diego between Feb. 1 and May 1 of each year through 2020 if they pay off bonds tied to the expansion of Qualcomm Stadium in 1997, which would be about $24 million.

The Chargers are one of five teams, along with the St. Louis Rams, Jacksonville Jaguars, Oakland Raiders and Minnesota Vikings, with whom Leiweke has had conversations about relocating to Los Angeles.

Sen. Christine Kehoe, whose district represents San Diego, and Sen. Loni Hancock, whose district represents Oakland, did not vote for the bill despite commending it, saying they were worried Farmers Field could become the future home of the Chargers or Raiders.

Leiweke said CEQA and lengthy environmental lawsuits were the biggest concerns for Anschutz and teams interested in moving to Los Angeles and Friday's ruling should ease those concerns and allow for an NFL team to move to Los Angeles as early as next season if AEG can get past the environmental process and legal challenges before June.

"There are certain boxes we had to check to make Mr. Anschutz comfortable with this and this is one of those boxes," Leiweke said.

Read More: http://espn.go.com/los-angeles/nfl/story/_/id/6948868/california-passes-bill-ease-building-farmers-field

saiholmes

September 28th, 2011, 04:21 AM

http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/.a/6a00d8341c630a53ef014e8bdd3910970d-pi

Brown signs bill to help speed L.A. NFL stadium
Los Angeles Times
September 27, 2011 | 3:27 pm

Photo: California Gov. Jerry Brown, surrounded by labor leaders, local and state officials, signs two bills at the L.A. Convention Center, the site of a proposed new stadium. Credit: Kevork Djansezian/Getty Images

Tim Leiweke stood in front of the West Hall of the L.A. Convention Center on Tuesday and told a roaring crowd: “Tear it down!”

The order was a bit premature. Leiweke, the chairman and chief executive of Anschutz Entertainment Group, will have to wait until June at the earliest to break ground on the 72,000-seat NFL stadium that AEG hopes to build at the site.

But on Tuesday the massive project inched closer to reality when Gov. Jerry Brown signed into law a controversial bill that limits lawsuits that could delay the $1.4 billion project.

At a news conference with Leiweke, a gaggle of politicians and two high school football teams, Brown said California’s high unemployment means it's time “for big ideas and big projects.”

Along with the stadium legislation, the governor also signed a similar but more far-reaching bill that grants certain large construction projects faster judicial reviews of environmental issues. The bills, Brown said, are focused on “cutting red tape all over the state.” “There are too many damn regulations,” he said.

Both bills require the projects to include green features, but they have divided the environmental community. The stadium bill was supported by the Natural Resources Defense Council, but opposed by the Planning and Conservation League.

"I think laws should apply evenly to everybody," said Bruce Reznik, executive director of the League. "I think it’s a very dangerous precedent when any company can come along and have enough power and influence to get a law that basically says you are treated differently than everybody else."

Sierra Club California Director Kathryn Phillips said the governor and Legislature are "flailing" about in an attempt to find ways to create new jobs and chose the wrong method in the two bills signed Tuesday.

"They are not going to help the economy. They are just going to hurt the environment," Phillips said of the bills.

Read More: http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/lanow/2011/09/tim-leiweke-stood-in-front-of-the-west-hall-of-the-los-angeles-convention-center-and-told-a-roaring-crowd-tear-it-down.html

LANative

September 28th, 2011, 05:28 AM

Congrats on Gov. Brown signing the bill! The hardest part now is getting a team. AEG said they won't build Farmers Field until they know for sure a team is willing to relocate to Los Angeles (I'm hoping it's the Rams. After all, that was OUR team to begin with). They also said by the end of this NFL season, a team should announce if they're moving to L.A. and if they do they will play at either the Rose Bowl or the Coliseum temperarily until Farmers Field is finished.

Along with the stadium legislation, the governor also signed a similar but more far-reaching bill that grants certain large construction projects faster judicial reviews of environmental issues. The bills, Brown said, are focused on “cutting red tape all over the state.” “There are too many damn regulations,” he said.

Also good news!

Kenny

September 28th, 2011, 05:47 AM

Great news! God Job Gov. Brown.

So construction wont possibly start till June of 2012, that's fine.

BTW, the Rams were not our original team, they moved here also. Our original LA team which was born here is the Chargers.

LosAngelesSportsFan

September 28th, 2011, 06:35 AM

theres also more good news coming. This little tidbit was from the BlogDowntown article..

Afterward, Leiweke hinted toward an upcoming announcement that would bring something new around the stadium plans.

"There's a pretty revolutionary idea coming that people are going to hear that we are going to factor into Farmers Field," he told reporters, though he declined any followup questions.

LANative

September 28th, 2011, 07:25 AM

I wonder what it can be? Hopefully it won't be long when AEG announces their secret plans involving Farmers Field.

I'm still excited though! And it must be big and AEG probably had their secret plan in the works for a while now.

tanzirian

September 28th, 2011, 05:57 PM

Good to see steady forward movement on this project!

LANative

September 29th, 2011, 09:33 AM

I think the years 2015-2016 will be the biggest and busiest years for the city of Los Angeles in my opinion. By then, Farmers Field will be complete at the same time Wilshire Grand Towers will be under construction, the Regional connector will be well underway along with the Westside subway (purple line).

Phase 2 of the Expo Line should be either finished or almost complete by then. Our streetcars will hopefully be in service by then too along with the continuing revitalization of Downtown L.A.

klamedia

September 29th, 2011, 05:24 PM

Well if Brown is involved I hope to think that it is something concerning the urban form or environment.....AEG will fully pay for the street car?

Kenny

September 29th, 2011, 06:26 PM

Is this the aformentioned "revival of the Red car" on Broadway?

LosAngelesSportsFan

September 29th, 2011, 08:11 PM

Well if Brown is involved I hope to think that it is something concerning the urban form or environment.....AEG will fully pay for the street car?

this is what i have been thinking from the beginning. It would be a huge boost to Downtown LA, wouldnt be too much of a financial burden for AEG (since they would be paying a large share of it anyways due to all the land they own on the route) and would be a win win since it would help the transportation options to LA Live and Farmers and would garner plenty of good will from the downtown LA community for AEG. I also hope they fund the Myfigueroa project lol

pesto

October 2nd, 2011, 07:01 PM

Farmers plus a trolley to Bway and Grand is a winner. But AEG shouldn't have to pay all of it; let the local businesses kick in as well. This is a reality check on whether there is any belief over there that it really will help business.

vahebaronian

November 16th, 2011, 01:04 AM

New Design..Wow!!

AEG reveals new, open design for Farmers Field
November 15, 2011 | 2:30 pm 20

Architects of Farmers Field have redesigned the planned new Los Angeles NFL stadium, creating a lighter-appearing venue with a new deployable roof that will be used minimally.

"This makes it feel much more like a football stadium and it will not detract from a beautiful Sunday afternoon," said Tim Romani, chief executive of Icon Venue Group, which is overseeing the design.

The stadium differs from the original concept released earlier this year, adding a nearly clear covering that was used on the signature Bird's Nest at the 2008 Olympics in Beijing.

Vacated, the deployable roof leaves "flight-like" wing coverings at the roof line to allow for increased openness.

"You couldn't do this in Minneapolis or Miami," Romani said, adding the deployable roof can be taken off and stored "in a matter of hours."

"This showcases the advantage of being in Los Angeles, how people would rather be outside or inside," said Ron Turner, principal of the project's lead architect, Gensler. "We need a symbol, a gateway. It's important for people to say, 'Wow! That's L.A.' "

The home NFL team will determine whether to leave the roof on or not, said Michael Roth, spokesman for stadium developer AEG.

Stadium builders are on target to submit an environmental impact report in January, hopeful of approval by the summer, with groundbreaking next year and the ability to play regular-season games for the 2016 season, officials said.

Farmers Field expects to bid for the Super Bowl in 2017, the game's 50th anniversary.

The planned 72,000-seat stadium is to be squeezed between Staples Center and L.A. Live and take over for a demolished West Hall of the Convention Center.

"Because of the tightness, we wanted a very light building," Turner said.

Turner has put most fans seated along the sidelines, opening the north end zone for a view of the city.

It might deprive the home team of more roaring as the opposing team drives toward the north end zone, but Turner said establishing "connectivity" to Los Angeles was important.

"It was too enclosed, I felt the original concept was too heavy," Romani said. "This building is now so airy it looks like it could take flight."

vahebaronian

November 16th, 2011, 01:08 AM

http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/sports_blog/2011/11/aeg-farmers-field-new-design.html

ryebreadraz

November 16th, 2011, 02:27 AM

I can't decide if I like it. I keep going back and forth. I feel like I won't know until/if it is built, but credit to AEG. They've been rather conservative and bland in their architecture to this point. This is anything but.

redspork02

November 16th, 2011, 04:19 AM

Shoulder pads statdium! lol

https://p.twimg.com/AeUw2pYCAAAnLNq.jpg:large

https://p.twimg.com/AeUyPaLCIAA1EXg.jpg:large

https://p.twimg.com/AeUzsxvCIAAnaD-.jpg:large

https://p.twimg.com/AeU0nAoCEAAX9QZ.jpg:large

https://p.twimg.com/AeU14xgCEAAk0ud.jpg:large

With Roof Closed!!
https://p.twimg.com/AeU3HJaCMAAYSxR.jpg:large

future_trance011

November 16th, 2011, 07:05 AM

Awesome!

I'm pretty sure some folks will have a hard time embracing this new Gensler design, as they are too conditioned/brainwashed into seeing the bland, boxy designs littering the Los Angeles landscape. But I believe with the passage of time more people will learn to embrace it.

Some ppl are calling it the "Shoulder Pads" stadium, but it looks more like bat wings to me...and no matter what it is reminiscent of, it's beautiful to me and definitely something different (much more than I envisioned).

slipperydog

November 16th, 2011, 07:46 AM

tanzirian

November 16th, 2011, 11:52 AM

^^ I heard news commentary opining that the "wings" were appropriate for the City of Angels.

To my eyes, this roof also complements the shape of the LA Live tower rather nicely.

This project is headed in the right direction...

losangelino

November 16th, 2011, 05:57 PM

http://www.ladowntownnews.com/news/first-a-new-dodgers-owner-then-a-new-downtown-stadium/article_dae26c04-0cc9-11e1-87d6-001cc4c03286.html

pesto

November 16th, 2011, 06:28 PM

There was also a comment that it should be "The Flying Nun" Stadium, which would also tie-in with angels, I suppose.

A great improvement over the cramped humpy-back stadium from the first renderings. Get rid of the roof altogether, and I could support it.

ryebreadraz

November 17th, 2011, 01:32 AM

http://www.ladowntownnews.com/news/first-a-new-dodgers-owner-then-a-new-downtown-stadium/article_dae26c04-0cc9-11e1-87d6-001cc4c03286.html

A baseball stadium could not double as convention space. A baseball stadium would be a difficult fit on the site and would likely not leave room for the convention center expansion. A baseball stadium may net one All-Star Game, but that pales in comparison to many Super Bowls, Final Fours and college football games. That's just the start of a plan that is horribly flawed.

If AEG wants the Dodgers and a baseball stadium they can do it, but it won't be on that site. This whole thing is fanciful dreaming without a foot on the ground.

losangelino

November 17th, 2011, 07:09 AM

A baseball stadium could not double as convention space. A baseball stadium would be a difficult fit on the site and would likely not leave room for the convention center expansion. A baseball stadium may net one All-Star Game, but that pales in comparison to many Super Bowls, Final Fours and college football games. That's just the start of a plan that is horribly flawed.

If AEG wants the Dodgers and a baseball stadium they can do it, but it won't be on that site. This whole thing is fanciful dreaming without a foot on the ground.

I agree, but the giddyness to upend the football stadium was suprising. I am growing very suspicious of AEG after hearing this and their genuine desire to bring football back to LA now. This article is scary.

They have enough room in the parking lot at dodger staduim to build an entirely new stadium while operating the other until finished. Why not demolish it after? The views of downtown from the opposite direction are better anyhow.

milquetoast

November 17th, 2011, 11:39 AM

Well, that looks like an 800 million dollar retractible roof covering 500 million dollars worth of High School grade aluminum bleachers. Hope it doesn't get windy 'cause the roof doesn't seem to be integrated into the rest of the structure, as little of it as there is. . I just ... I can't get over what we can build for 1.35 Billion and what Dallas can build for 1.7 Billion. I'm just comparing the two in my head .......................................................................................................... ................... still comparing - I'm scared to actually Google the two and hold them side by side ............................................................................ that's about to happen anyways so, here I go ................. G ... O ... O ... G ... L ... E ............... hmmmm, they actually got to keep their name ........................................ ... COWBOYS .............. STADIUM ..................................................... IMAGES ........................................................................................................................................................... . . . FUCK . Just found out they cost the same. The Texas dome is the world's largest column free dome and the facility can be used for the same things ours can, except it looks a tad more mature and substantial in design. That's HKS for ya. Compare the two for yourself! :lol: You're gonna shit!

saiholmes

November 18th, 2011, 06:54 AM

http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/.a/6a00d8341c630a53ef0153931a72fa970b-600wi

Farmers Field designs released
By Arash Markazi
ESPNLosAngeles.com
Tuesday, November 15, 2011
Updated: November 16, 1:16 PM ET

LOS ANGELES -- Farmers Field will be an open-air stadium after all.

Nearly a year after AEG revealed preliminary architectural renderings of Farmers Field from three design firms, Gensler, the architectural firm chosen to design the $1.1 billion proposed football stadium in downtown Los Angeles, finally revealed how it would ultimately look and there was one big change.

The stadium will now feature a "deployable" roof instead of a retractable or fixed roof that would be assembled on the ground and lifted into place for events such as conventions and the Final Four, and disassembled and stored underneath the stadium when it is not in use. The process of assembling and disassembling the roof would take "a matter of hours," said Tim Romani, president of ICON Venue Group, the project management firm AEG hired for Farmers Field.

"A retractable roof really does detract from the openness of the stadium, you have to store it up somewhere in the rafters and it does take up a lot of space," Romani said. "Los Angeles has the perfect climate and football should be played outside. So many other events should be played outside as well so we wanted to have it as open as we could. L.A.'s climate is very predictable so we aren't going to have a rush to put a roof in place. It's the greatest solution for the best outdoor facility and the best indoor facility."

AEG president and CEO Tim Leiweke had previously said Farmers Field would need to have a fixed or retractable roof because it is being used as an extension of the Los Angeles Convention Center and would also be bidding to host the Final Four, which would require the venue to have a roof.

The idea of having a domed stadium in Los Angeles, however, was never a popular idea amongst locals used to living in a city that is seemingly 75 degrees and sunny year-round.

"Farmers Field will host every kind of entertainment and sports event imaginable but it is not a venue that needs to have a roof that can open or close within minutes," said Ron Turner, principal of Gensler. "The right solution is to build a great open-air stadium and devise a roof strategy that can be deployed as a temporary roof insert."

The new design, which looks like a cross between football shoulder pads and a paper airplane, features wings covering the plaza areas around the stadium. The stadium's facade and the deployable roof will be constructed out of the same foil air panels (ETFE) used on Allianz Arena, the German soccer stadium used during the 2006 World Cup, and the Beijing National Aquatics Center, used during the 2008 Summer Olympics. The material is translucent, making the inside of the venue visible from the street and it can be lit up in a variety of different colors at night.

"Football was meant to be played outdoors, especially in a climate like Los Angeles," Turner said. "It would be a mistake to build a stadium like Farmers Field with only a hole in the roof."

Gensler, which was chosen as the architect for Farmers Field in March, has never designed an NFL stadium. The international architectural firm, which recently moved to downtown Los Angeles from Santa Monica, has worked with AEG on the Staples Center as well as the L.A. Live campus; designing the new 54-story JW Marriott and Ritz Carlton hybrid tower across from Staples Center.

AEG is on schedule to submit an environmental impact report in January and would like to get an approval along with a definitive agreement from the city in June. AEG's deal with the city, however, states that groundbreaking on the project would not be able to take place until an NFL team signed a long-term lease to play at Farmers Field. Such a lease could not be signed by a team until February 2013 at the earliest since NFL rules state a team must file a written notice with the NFL commissioner "no later than February 15 of the year in which the move is scheduled to occur."

If construction begins in February 2013, the earliest the stadium would be open is September 2016. In the meantime the NFL team that relocates to Los Angeles would play in either the Coliseum or the Rose Bowl.

The plan is to first tear down the West Hall of the Los Angeles Convention and build a $275 million replacement hall over Pico Boulevard that would connect to Farmers Field. Construction would then begin on the 68,000-seat football stadium that would be expandable to 78,000 seats for big events like the Super Bowl and Final Four and also be in position to bid on international events like the World Cup and Olympics.

"This will be one of the most recognized and photographed buildings not only in Los Angeles but in the United States," Romani said. "It is the best of both worlds. It is a facility that can host the greatest indoor events and outdoor events on the planet."

Arash Markazi is a reporter and columnist for ESPNLosAngeles.com.

Read More: http://espn.go.com/los-angeles/nfl/story/_/id/7240406/aeg-reveals-open-air-design-los-angeles-farmers-field