Oakland Makes Play To Prevent Raiders From Moving To Las VegasCity Wants To Talk With Team About New Stadium |
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The city of Oakland isn’t going to let its NFL move away without a fight. According to a report from Bloomberg, the mayor is prepared to come up with a proposal for a new stadium.
The Oakland Coliseum opened in 1966 and has 56,000 seats for football, nearly 10,000 fewer than a proposed domed stadium in Las Vegas, the gambling capital of America.
The plan from Oakland comes just weeks after Las Vegas officials and Nevada lawmakers approved a plan for a $1.9 billion stadium that would include $750 million in public funding. The subsidy is the largest ever for a professional sports stadium in America.
The decision to allow such a large public contribution was controversial, but the casino industry labeled the NFL stadium a “game changer.” According to casino industry estimates, a NFL team in Las Vegas would bring 800,000 additional people to the city annually and generate $620 million in annual economic activity.
Las Vegas Sands Corp., owner of the Venetian and Palazzo, would develop the stadium. A site hasn’t been picked yet, but it’s down to just two locations near the south end of the Strip.
The tax subsidy would come from raising a hotel room tax by less than one percent.
Raiders owner Mark Davis has not wavered from his commitment to Las Vegas. Nevada Governor Brian Sandoval said in a statement last week: “I trust Mark Davis. I take him at his word.”
Davis has said that he plans to file the relocation paperwork in January.
The plan to negotiate with the Raiders on a new Oakland stadium is currently under review by he Alameda County Board of Supervisors and the Oakland City Council.
The potential of competition from Oakland also comes just weeks after Las Vegas Sands owner Sheldon Adelson made pessimistic comments about the negotiations with the Raiders. Adelson has pledged $650 million toward the stadium. A report from NBC Sports stated that Adelson could be vying for a controlling interest in a Las Vegas Raiders franchise.
NFL owners still need to meet to vote on whether the Raiders can relocate. That vote was initially planned for January, but has apparently been pushed back to the spring.
While Commissioner Roger Goodell didn’t say gambling was a concern for a possible Raiders move, he did say that the NFL remains opposed to legalized sports betting.
However, he did indicate that Oakland losing its team wouldn’t be anything to cheer about. “You never want to see a community lose their franchise once, much less twice,” Goodell said in September.
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