Bay Area political leaders say they're considering suing the Oakland Raiders football team and the National Football League after team owners approved moving the franchise to Las Vegas.
NFL owners voted 31-1 on March 27 to permit the Raiders to relocate to Las Vegas, which promised $750 million in public money to help finance a new $1.9 billion domed stadium near the Mandalay Bay Resort on Russell Road.
The Miami Marlins were the only NFL team to vote against the move, according to the San Francisco Chronicle newspaper. The Raiders had called Oakland home since 1960 except for 1982-1994 when they played in Los Angeles.
No to Oakland
The NFL brain trust rejected last-minute appeals from Mayor Libby Schaaf and other local leaders to keep the Raiders in Oakland, where it had become one of the league's most recognizable teams. Schaaf said it came down whether Oakland, a traditional working-class city that still owes more than $80 million it borrowed to put together the deal that lured the Raiders back in 1995, would continue to be able to subsidize the team.
“Every year we cut a check out of our general fund — money that could be used for any city service goes to pay that construction bill," Schaaf said. "
U.S. Rep. Barbara Lee of Oakland said she was "deeply troubled" by the NFL vote to allow the Raiders to move.
"This decision flies in the face of the NFL's own guidelines and displays a callous disregard for the loyal fans who have enabled the Raiders to thrive for generations,” Lee said in a written statement.
No on funding
Schaaf had steadfastly refused to commit taxpayer funds to the Raiders, proposing instead that Oakland use mostly private investments to build a new complex and stadium on the site of the current Oakland-Alameda County Coliseum and Arena, the newspaper said.
But she did agree to commit $200 million in public money for infrastructure improvements to the area.
Schaaf also reportedly refused NFL demands to evict the Oakland Athletics baseball team from the stadium the two teams share, the newspaper said. “There was no way we were ever going to compete with the money Vegas was offering, and frankly, there are many people who say we shouldn’t,” said Chris Dobbins, a member of the public authority that runs the stadium.
Dobbins also leads a local group that had been campaigning to retain the Raiders, the newspaper said.
Legal threat?
Among the issues expected to be raised by Oakland if it decides to go to court is whether Raiders' owner Mark Davis, son of original Raiders owner Al Davis, negotiated with the city in good faith. Schaaf said Raiders ownership have refused to meet with city officials for the past year.
The city is expected to allege that the Raiders and the NFL did not negotiate in good faith by only agreeing to meet with Oakland officials one time in the past year. But the Raiders contend that the city nearly quadrupled the rent the team paid to use the Coliseum last year
Plans for the new facility in Nevada call for the Raiders to share the proposed dome with the University of Nevada, Las Vegas.
If the team does move to Las Vegas, it would be the second major sports franchise to leave Oakland this decade.
The Golden State Warriors, the National Basketball Association's Western Conference champions, have announced plans to abandon the Oakland complex's indoor arena in the next few years. The Warriors are expected to move to a new facility under construction across the bay in San Francisco.
