San Diego vs. Chargers - All Over But the Divorce Decree

Mayor Faulconer appears to have played a weak hand badly with regards to negotiations with the Chargers, if his goal was to keep the Chargers in San Diego.  Jeffrey Siniard has been covering the situation at www.boltsfromtheblue.com:

Mistakes made by the City of San Diego:
1. Mayor Faulconer and his staff got in over their heads the moment they didn't realize how much pressure the Chargers were under to make a deal, and assumed it was primarily an attempt by the Chargers to manufacture leverage.
2. A better understanding of the situation by Falconer and his staff could have led to an earlier City/County partnership, earlier hiring of negotiating experts, who then could've worked with CSAG to produce a polished offer in shorter time.
3. Instead of ignoring all of the noise coming from the Chargers, the City has instead chosen to respond in kind, which abets the Chargers "We have to Los Angeles" narrative.

But I also agree with Siniard said earlier in the same article, Falulconer's main goal seems to be to avoid blame should the Chargers leave town.  Charger attorney Fabiani's overheated rhetoric serves that end so well, it makes you wonder if it isn't a conspiracy.

In a more recent post Siniard argues that the December election is a sure loser for the City:

- There is no solution the Chargers and/or the NFL will accept in San Diego for 2015. Stop trying to come up with one. Much as people want the Chargers to accept San Diego's idea, they are a private business and are under no obligation to accept it.
- All of the options presented by San Diego for getting around the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) carry a significant degree of risk from a successful lawsuit, or take too long to complete for a vote in 2015.
- Furthermore, no deal in San Diego can beat the deal the Chargers have put together with the Raiders in Carson. Until that option disappears, there's no reason for the Chargers and/or Raiders to negotiate in good faith with their home markets. The Chargers and Raiders are going to see how Los Angeles plays out this year. They'd be stupid to do otherwise.

I have argued that there is no way the Chargers can remain in town, because we will never be able to compete with Los Angeles in terms of what the city gives away to the team.  Siniard take the view that the only way to keep the Chargers here is to apply pressure on the NFL. But he is clear that it only buys some time for an election to be held during "prime time" that would have a chance of passing a plan that would satisfy the Chargers.  Too many ifs, in my opinion; better to just let the team walk rather than divert leadership attention from other pressing problems.

Qualcomm Stadium By Intersofia at en.wikipedia [CC BY-SA 2.0], from Wikimedia Commons

What You Should Be Reading:

• The Voice of San Diego, because even if they are left of center, they break important stories.  It's called journalism and the national press should take notice.  Going after Dumanis in today's edition with more great investigative work. 

City Emails On Snapdragon Name Change

I have blogged my outrage a couple of times over local crony capitalism of Jerry Sanders giving away city naming rights to Qualcomm by allowing the temporary name change to Snapdragon. The U-T posted a treasure trove of emails that paint an unflattering picture. I have excerpted two of them here. Here is the city's CFO wondering why the city isn't getting a cut of the value of the advertising, hooray for Mary Lewis.



Here is Jay Goldstone, the Mayor's Chief Operating Officer, deciding that he has a license to practice law and that this whole signage thing is really all about how fast he can please his corporate buddies at Qualcomm.


Mr. Chris Larson is a senior planner for the city, also presumably, not a lawyer.

Two things are very awry here. First, the city appeared to violate the law both on signage and the terms of the Qualcomm naming deal. Second, the city lost out on a money making opportunity that might have helped the taxpayers. But the deeper malaise that infects city hall defies logic; why did the city staff trip all over themselves to help out a local corporation? I am not anti-business, I am just against business advancing their interests at the expense of the taxpayers. This is a long term trend in San Diego that needs to end.

Snapdragon Illegal Naming Update

In a previous post, I discussed the apparently illegal, crony capitalist tactics of Mayor Sanders' office in allowing Qualcomm Stadium to be renamed to Snapdragon without council approval. This was done despite a city attorney memo advising against it and the fact that the city could have used the revenue that Qualcomm might have delivered to get the advertising value out of the name change. As I wrote:

The temporary name change of Jack Murphy Qualcomm Stadium to Snapdragon, despite a memo from City Attorney Jan Goldsmith that the name change was not authorized unless approved by the City Council just disgusts me. The city loses money every year on the stadium, undermining public support for everything else that Mayor Sanders has proposed, including a new City Hall. Why would the mayor engage in such an egregious display of crony capitalism, in effect donating millions of dollars of free advertising revenue to Qualcomm?

Now emails released to the U-T Watchdog under a public records request have shown that the city's CFO had questions.

San Diego’s chief financial officer questioned whether the city was being appropriately paid for a temporary name change of Qualcomm Stadium to endorse the company’s Snapdragon processor on the same day Mayor Jerry Sanders held a news conference touting the promotion.

Of course, no one responded to the question. Worse it turns out that Qualcomm paid the city a paltry $1000 to "cover expenses" but what might be viewed as a tacit admission that their actions might have legal ramifications.

We have further questioning from city officials about the legalities of this deal, but Mayor Sanders is more concerned about keeping buddy-buddy with local corporate giant Qualcomm.

Local Republican Crony Capitalism

Mayor Sanders performs a nice little feat of local crony capitalism, as first reported by the San Diego Reader. From the U-T.

San Diego Mayor Jerry Sanders allowed Qualcomm Stadium to be temporarily renamed Snapdragon Stadium to promote the wireless chip giant’s smartphone processor during three nationally televised football games despite advice from the City Attorney’s Office that the move wasn’t legally permissible and amounted to free advertising.

The Dec. 7 memo from City Attorney Jan Goldsmith said the terms of the naming rights agreement with Qualcomm don’t allow the company to make any changes, even on a temporary basis, without written consent authorized by the City Council, which never happened. The change also appears to have violated the city’s sign ordinance which generally prohibits off-site advertising, such as billboards and signs, for products that aren’t sold on the premises.

“Qualcomm’s proposal seeks to use the identifying signage to promote its new product without paying any additional consideration to which the city would otherwise be entitled,” the memo said. “Qualcomm does not have that right under the agreement. Per the agreement, the content of the identifying signs is clearly limited to the name of the stadium as ‘Qualcomm Stadium’ and not subject to use for advertising.”

The temporary name change of Jack Murphy Qualcomm Stadium to Snapdragon, despite a memo from City Attorney Jan Goldsmith that the name change was not authorized unless approved by the City Council just disgusts me. The city loses money every year on the stadium, undermining public support for everything else that Mayor Sanders has proposed, including a new City Hall. Why would the mayor engage in such an egregious display of crony capitalism, in effect donating millions of dollars of free advertising revenue to Qualcomm? What is the value of exposure to the approximately 30 million viewers that watched the three games during the temporary name change? The mayor seems totally insensitive to taxpayer sentiment, his false claims of calamity in support of Prop D come to mind. Why elect Republicans if they are just going to gouge taxpayers on behalf of big business, as opposed to Democrats gouging the taxpayers on behalf of the employees unions. This is an example of why we shouldn't put government in charge of anything intended to make money. It's also why I plan to vote for Carl DeMaio, because I believe he is the Republican least likely to engage in such shenanigans in the future.