Chargers Find It Easier to Secure Wins Than New Stadium Site
Team Has Invested 6 Years, $10 Million in Hopes of Getting First-Class Home

Fan optimism is running high as the San Diego Chargers prepare for the 2008 season, but the excitement has nothing to do with the prospects of building a new stadium.

The team owners, the Spanos family, have been seeking a state-of-the-art football palace for six years, with little progress.

"I never would have predicted that we’d be still at this point in San Diego … but we are a lot closer to the end of this process than we are to the beginning of the process," said Mark Fabiani, point man on the project for the Chargers, who kick off thee season with an exhibition game Aug. 9.

In addition to trying to live up to Super Bowl expectations, the team is focusing on Chula Vista, which has thrown out the welcome mat for the Chargers. Last year, Oceanside and National City told the team thanks, but no thanks.

The Chargers say they cannot get a deal done in the city of San Diego, their current home, because of the lack of a development partner, indifference on the part of Mayor Jerry Sanders, and outright antagonism from City Attorney Michael Aguirre.

Looking South

On the other hand, Chula Vista, the county’s second-largest city, has been receptive to a stadium replacing an ugly electric power plant on the bay.

However, before it can look at a stadium deal, Chula Vista said its main priority is a more lucrative development project also on the bay; a proposal by Tennessee-based Gaylord Entertainment to build a convention center and hotel.

Then there are the skyrocketing construction costs. A new stadium will likely run from $800 million to $1 billion, due to rising costs.

"It’s been a frustrating year. I don’t want to sugarcoat it, but the team isn’t pulling up stakes in 2009," Fabiani said.

After this season, the Chargers can legally opt out of their lease and move. Doing so would mean paying off $56 million in bonds issued in 1997 for the expansion of Qualcomm.

One option could be in the City of Industry, where billionaire Ed Roski is building a stadium without a team. Roski and the Spanoses have worked on deals together in the past, Fabiani says.

Jim Lackritz, San Diego State University’s associate dean at the College of Business Administration, says that while the National Football League discourages franchise moves, the chance of putting a popular team into the nation’s second-largest media market may be too great to pass up. Los Angeles, formerly home of the Raiders and Rams, has been without professional football since 1995.

Time Running Out?

Lackritz wonders how much longer the Spanoses can stick around if there’s little or no progress.

"They’ve been working on this for six years, and spent about $10 million," he said. "At some point you would say I’m tired of this, and I’m going to go someplace else to make it work."

Lee Hamilton, a radio talk show host and Chargers broadcaster for 10 years, says the Spanoses "missed the boat" in negotiating a stadium deal with the city of San Diego eight years ago.

"They could have built the stadium then for about $450 million. Now there’s no (NFL stadium loan) money, we’re in a recession, and they’re without a business partner," Hamilton said. "In our recessionary world, the timing just does not fit."

Some speculate that if Aguirre is defeated in his re-election effort in November, the Chargers would seek a deal with the city, which owns the 166-acre Mission Valley site.

Fabiani rejects the notion, saying the site doesn’t work because the condo market has tanked. (The Chargers’ original plan called for the city giving the Bolts 60 acres to build 6,000 residential units along with commercial space in return for assuming the costs of stadium and infrastructure improvements.)

Some say the Chargers will stay in San Diego because that’s where a stadium makes the best business sense.

Len Simon, part of a mayor’s task force investigating the stadium issue in 2002, doesn’t believe the team has written off San Diego.

"A lot of people are sitting on their hands right now, waiting to see what Chula Vista does, and see if they can’t do it," Simon said. "The Chargers are not going anyplace until they get the right deal, but the right deal may be hard to come by these days."

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