• AEG Wants to Break Ground Next Year on Football Stadium — KNBC
• AEG president outlines plans for downtown L.A. Stadium — Daily News
• NFL lockout is over: Are you ready for a downtown L.A. football stadium? -- KPCC Radio
• Once the City and AEG Sign a Stadium Deal, the Real Game Starts — LA Downtown News
• AEG’s attention focused on LA, not KC — KC Star
NewsConference: Majestic Realty Co. Vice President John Semcken
Conan Nolan, KNBC-TV
July 24, 2011
Video: http://www.nbclosangeles.com/on-air/as-seen-on/NewsConference__Majestic_Realty_Co__Vice_President_John_Semcken_Los_Angeles-126044658.html
John Semcken is the point man for the City of Industry football stadium project. He says his group is ready to build the stadium as soon as a team is in place. They already have two approved environmental impact reports where as AEG must still pass theirs.
AEG Wants to Break Ground Next Year on Football Stadium
Conan Nolan, KNBC
July 24, 2011
Video: http://www.nbclosangeles.com/blogs/prop-zero/AEG-Wants-to-Break-Ground-Next-Year-on-Football-Stadium-126085604.html
If you build it, they will come.
That's the hope of AEG CEO and President Tim Leiweke as his company prepares to break ground on Farmer's Field in an effort to attract an NFL team to Los Angeles.
"The commissioner has encouraged us to talk to anyone and everyone that wants to talk to us and we've done that," Leiweke told NBC4. "
Leiweke said unlike many cities hoping to subsidize a football stadium with tax revenue, his company is willing to pay for the stadium outright—and that may be the secret to luring a team to Los Angeles.
"Some of the teams that are playing in old stadiums that are non-competitive especially in the new economics of the NFL, we're going to have teams that want to move to LA," Leiweke said.
AEG is ready to break ground the first part of next year on the stadium, according to Leiweke.
"We have an owner here that has the capability of stepping up and saying 'this is about a billion-and-a-half-dollars I'm going to have to risk and I'm prepared to do it.'"
The project is estimated to cost nearly $1 billion. Leiweke said the 65,000-seat stadium with a retractable roof would be built on the site of the western hall of the Convention Center.
A 30-year naming-rights deal with Farmers Insurance Exchange, potentially worth $700 million, would help underwrite some of the cost.
The plan is one of two stadium proposals with hopes of attracting an NFL team to Los Angeles for the first time since 1995, when the Rams moved to St. Louis and the Raiders returned to Oakland.
AEG president outlines plans for downtown L.A. stadium
Rick Orlov, Staff Writer
Posted: 07/22/2011 09:11:29 PM PDT
With the deadline looming for the city to commit to a downtown football stadium, AEG President Tim Leiweke hinted Friday at some of the key provisions a deal could contain.
"I understand the skeptics out there," Leiweke told members of the downtown Rotary Club during a noontime speech. "I am not saying this hasn't been controversial, but clearly, this is a different vision, a different time.
"I get how people are suspicious. I get how people don't trust their governments. I get that coming to the city government and asking them to pay for a stadium is the wrong thing to do - not at a time when you are taking $54 million from the (budget of the) fire department."
Anschutz Entertainment Group has proposed razing the West Hall of the Convention Center and building a modern exhibition facility on Pico Boulevard.
It then would build a 72,000- to 76,000-seat stadium on the former convention hall site, adjacent to its Staples Center complex. The stadium would have a retractable dome to allow it to be used for conventions.
Leiweke said the proposal will demonstrate that AEG plans to cover all costs of the stadium, now estimated at $1.1 billion.
"The deal that will be presented is a pretty simple one," Leiweke said. "We will pay for (the stadium) no matter what it costs. We will operate it. We will maintain it."
He also said that upgrading the Convention Center will increase business for the nearby Marriott Center and
any new hotels to be built downtown as Los Angeles becomes a stronger competitor for major conventions.
"The No. 1 business in Los Angeles is the convention-tourist sector," Leiweke said.
AEG has asked the city to issue bonds to finance the Convention Center project, with AEG reimbursing the city through advertising revenue and property taxes to be paid on the football stadium land.
Originally, the bond issue was estimated at $350 million, but Leiweke said that has been reduced with AEG's commitment to pay for parking spaces.
AEG has set a July 31 deadline for getting city approval of the deal, and officials are expected to devote much of next week working on the AEG deal.
The proposed memorandum of understanding listing the deal points between the city and AEG is expected to be released on Monday, with the Ad Hoc Committee on the Downtown Stadium holding two public hearings - one on Wednesday night at City Hall and a second on Thursday night at the Van Nuys municipal building.
The full council is scheduled to consider the proposal next Friday, when it has devoted its entire meeting to the stadium plan.
NFL lockout is over: Are you ready for a downtown L.A. football stadium?
Audio: Paul Krekorian Interview
http://www.scpr.org/programs/patt-morrison/2011/07/22/20000/nfl-lockout-is-over-are-you-ready-for-a-downtown-l
Now that the NFL lockout is over, with a new collective bargaining agreement in place and players ready to take the field for training camps almost immediately, all eyes in Los Angeles will turn toward … downtown.
In a city without a football team the end of the lockout means the resumption of hope, that a major deal to build a stadium in downtown L.A. (as well as a competing proposal to put a stadium in the City of Industry) is back on track. In fact, the succession of events on AEG’s proposal to build Farmers Field downtown, right next to the Staples Center, will move at an accelerated pace over the next week and the L.A. City Council could be voting on a stadium deal by next Friday.
L.A. city councilman Paul Krekorian said the council's first priority is protecting the taxpayers of Los Angeles.
"We can't put general revenue funds at risk to help support bringing football or any sports center to Los Angeles," Krekorian said.
An AEG-sponsored report that came out on Wednesday estimated that a $1 billion stadium and a new wing of the Convention Center would generate $22 million annually for the city.
Other proposed benefits of a new stadium include a revived economy and the opportunity for employment - from construction to stadium operations.
"It could very well turn out that this project is a job creator. But we shouldn't assume that," Krekorian said.
Meanwhile both AEG and the City Council are repeating promises and demands, respectively, that no taxpayer money goes into the construction of the stadium, although the details of any potential deal are largely unknown. A debate in front of the full City Council is scheduled for July 29 and Farmers Field itself, if all goes according to plan, would open in 2016. Could the end of the NFL lockout mark the beginning of the return of football in L.A.?
Once the City and AEG Sign a Stadium Deal, the Real Game Starts
Jon Regardie, LA Downtown News
Published: Friday, July 22
DOWNTOWN LOS ANGELES - On Tuesday, July 26, about 1,000 Down towners and approximately 600 canines will congregate on the plaza of the Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels for Dog Day Afternoon, a pooch-and-people social event that will be filled with plenty of sniffing and, probably, a decent amount of snapping.
Three days later, the 14 members of the City Council (Janice Hahn already escaped from L.A.) will meet in City Hall and spend hours discussing the proposed Farmers Field project. A week or two after the meeting, they will almost certainly vote in favor of approving the framework of a $1.3 billion deal with developer Anschutz Entertainment Group.
At this point, it’s impossible to tell which event will proceed in a more orderly fashion. There will probably be more barking at the Cathedral, though that’s not a given. During the council session they’ll likely spend more time trying to figure out who the alpha dog is and where he or she wants to take the pack. I have no idea which happening will produce more preening.
Perhaps the most interesting aspect of the Friday council session (which follows two other meetings of the council’s ad hoc stadium committee, including one on Wednesday at City Hall at 5:30 p.m.) is that it’s not nearly as much of a game-changing moment as a lot of the rhetoric would lead one to believe. Whereas some have cast this as a drive down the field in the fourth quarter, one leading to a triumphant score, in reality the effort to return professional football to Los Angeles hasn’t even kicked off. This isn’t the final gun but rather pre-game festivities, and the deal with the city is only a precursor to the actual big-league stuff to come.
That said, the Friday council meeting should be entertaining. We’ll see some cheerleading, some quarterbacking and some fumbling too. The odds are overwhelming that all 14 members will each stand up and make a hearty mini-speech about how much they want football to return, but that boosting L.A.’s convention business and creating jobs is even more important. Expect about 9,000 football puns (“This deal will put us in the convention end zone,” etc.).
Then they’ll sit down and vote in favor of a deal. At least they’ll try — recently some members have had a hard time figuring out which button is yea and which is nay.
How Things Work
To date, the Farmers Field game has been pretty flawlessly executed by AEG. Even when they came to the table they were already two-time defending champions, having brought Downtown Staples Center (1999) and L.A. Live, the latter including the 1,001-room Convention Center hotel (2007-2009).
AEG and its quarterback, Tim Leiweke, learned long ago how things work on Spring Street. In fact, considering that the arena push began in the mid-1990s, the company has more experience inside City Hall than many of the people sitting around the council horseshoe (that’s part of what term limits get you). Long before Leiweke went public with plans for a 64,000-seat stadium with a retractable roof, he worked to get organized labor to champion the jobs-generating potential of the stadium and related ventures. Long before he broached the proposal to raze the aged West Hall and replace it with a new convention building contiguous to the main edifice, he crafted a proposal, complete with room to adjust when people protested, that doesn’t require the city to dip into the general fund.
The orchestrations continued last week. On Wednesday, July 20, AEG launched a couple cannons in the form of twin studies indicating — surprise! — that the project would be good not just for Downtown, but for the entire region. Central City Association President and CEO Carol Schatz led the press conference that included such findings as the stadium/expanded convention facilities will create $41 million in annual new tax revenue, with $22 million of that going to the city. Schatz cited the 2,400 hotel rooms that will spring up because of the venue. She said the number of hotel room nights booked by convention goers would approximately double, to about 550,000 annually.
In a word, ka-ching!
Even the verbiage was carefully crafted. Taking a page from political campaigns — and what is Farmers Field leading up to a City Hall vote if not a political campaign? — business and labor leaders stood up to literally “endorse” the project. One batch of union employees was clad in beige Pico Hall shirts, for the name of the convention building that will replace the West Hall. It was a nice touch for a building that hasn’t been approved or designed yet.
A representative of the Los Angeles Area Chamber of Commerce got up to state how the project will benefit the city, and proving that there’s no harm-no foul from a failed secession movement years ago, the leader of the Valley Industry & Commerce Association did the same, saying a big Downtown project is A-OK with him. Even a member of the LAX Coastal Chamber of Commerce, an organization I had no idea existed, waxed poetic on the benefits of Farmers Field.
“The impact of this project will be great on our member businesses,” said David Voss. He added that the LAX Chamber “heartily endorses this project.”
Late Wrangling
There will be some last-minute wrangling, just as there was before Staples Center was approved. Way back when, the arena developers (including Ed Roski, now head of the competing City of Industry stadium proposal) walked away at the 11th hour, angered by the city’s negotiating tactics. Late Council President John Ferraro assuaged the egos, brought everyone back to the table and the deal got inked and people celebrated and threw elephants in the air (I made that last part up). The South Park boom began.
Even as negotiations continue, the abovementioned orchestrations and the months of talks ensure that the city will approve the framework of a deal (that’s all this is; a formal contract wouldn’t be signed until next year at the earliest). About the only way this doesn’t happen is if half the council goes on a tequila bender, blacks out and, during that precise moment, 11th District rep Bill Rosendahl manages to clone himself seven times so he has eight votes with which to torpedo the project. Though even if that happens Rosendahl might vote four times for the project and four times against.
There’s too much money at stake for Farmers Field not to happen. Even if some negotiating points spark debate, everyone with a stake in the game knows that sticking with an aging convention building and not having a football stadium is a lose-lose. Having “crushed jobs-generating project” on your political resume won’t help in future elections.
Once the city says “Huzzah!,” however, the real muck begins. That’s when the National Football League, which for 17 years has treated Los Angeles the way Frank McCourt treats Dodger fans, moves to the forefront. While Leiweke has sold the heck out of the “NFL-wants-to-be-here” message, some folks who have long followed the effort to return football to the city say they’ve heard nothing indicating the league is now ready to move forward.
In fact, some expect that, once the league and its players complete a labor agreement, the NFL will stoke both the Downtown effort and the City of Industry stadium proposal, and possibly prompt others to enter the game, all in the effort to create a better deal for a team owner. The Raiders and Rams both left L.A. after the 1994 season, and few see a reason for the league to hurry or change tactics now.
This isn’t to say Downtown football won’t happen. Everyone is quick to mention that the AEG proposal is a level up from previous local football attempts. They’re right, but it doesn’t mean Los Angeles gets the deal of its dreams.
All it means is that, once the city says yes, the game really begins.
AEG’s attention focused on LA, not KC
SAM MELLINGER, The Kansas City Star
Friday, July 22, 2011
LOS ANGELES | You should see this. Perhaps the best big sports arena in the country is connected by underground tunnel to one of the nation’s premier theaters. A delicious mess of restaurants and bars sit a hockey rink’s distance away.
Two brand-new, high-end hotels overlook the whole thing, with more nearby and still more on the way, a remarkable development that’s taken this part of downtown Los Angeles from dumpster to epicenter.
You should really see this.
Actually, you were supposed to see this.
What’s happening here now is what we were told would happen in Kansas City.
That dream — the one Kansas City bought into seven years ago in approving construction of the Sprint Center — is now all but dead, at least in part because AEG, the company that pushed it on us, has moved on to a bigger project.
Kansas City was the warm-up act for AEG, like calisthenics for what’s happening in LA, roughly 1,600 miles from the Sprint Center but 100 yards from its worldwide headquarters.
Out here in LA, the hottest topic is AEG’s demand that the city council approve a tax-free plan by July 31 to build a new football stadium downtown that the company promises would attract an NFL franchise by next summer.
The measure is expected to pass in large part because AEG president and CEO Tim Leiweke is saying it’ll be easy to land a team. People back in Kansas City will remember that he’s used this playbook before.
Back at the Sprint Center, the chances of landing an NHL or NBA team have gone from Leiweke’s purported lock to cautiously hopeful to dying to now mostly forgotten.
We are yesterday’s news to the company that did everything but promise us a team.
If you still hold out any hope for a team coming to the Sprint Center, you should know the company that bragged about making it all happen for us is no longer motivated to work on our behalf.
It’s telling that Leiweke is quoted constantly in the Los Angeles media but hasn’t talked to anyone in Kansas City in quite some time. He didn’t return multiple messages for this column.
He is among the most powerful men in sports and most visible figures in LA — sitting courtside at Lakers games — but he’s mostly a ghost when it comes to what was once presented in Kansas City.
The official line out of AEG is that Leiweke will comment when something meaningful happens, which realistically means never.
Michael Roth, AEG vice president for communications, showed me around the company’s empire recently. When the conversation turned to what’s (not) happening in Kansas City, Roth talked around direct questions about whether the company is disappointed it hasn’t lived up to its boasts about putting a team in the Sprint Center and how much it’s still focused on doing so.
“Did we think it would be easier?” he said. “I guess so.”
The rest of the talk rehashed the same points that have been meaningless so far: Leiweke is on the NHL’s board of directors and is a close friend of NBA commissioner David Stern.
In the years since AEG’s big talk, one franchise in each league has moved, and there is no credible evidence that Kansas City was a serious candidate in either case. Our closest calls have been in hockey, but a deal for the Pittsburgh Penguins fell through at the 11th hour, and a deal for the Nashville Predators dissolved when the would-be owner was found to be a crook.
In fact, there are indications that Kansas City was a pawn in the Penguins’ getting a new arena in Pittsburgh and that AEG deserves criticism for not doing better research on the Predators’ deal.
That mostly falls in line with evidence showing AEG either whiffed on predicting how many franchises would be available for relocation or overestimated its own power to influence those moves.
The result is that Kansas City is left with nothing better than Leiweke’s strong reputation and a possibility that he “owes” us a team. AEG no longer holds exclusive rights to negotiate a team for the Sprint Center, and it would be a heck of a thing if some third party did what the reputed kingmaker couldn’t.
AEG points to the fact that the Sprint Center remains profitable to the city even without an anchor tenant. That’s an important point but also one that misses the issue. Funding for the building was passed in large part because of the carrot of attracting a major pro team, and AEG’s failure to follow through is at least partly to blame for the Power & Light District’s becoming a public money-suck.
It’s frustrating to see that a similar blueprint is working beautifully in LA. Everything that AEG hasn’t done in Kansas City is being executed brilliantly in southern California.
Sports fans there have a world-class arena and theaters, a huge selection of restaurants and bars in which to hang out before and after events, relatively smooth traffic and parking … and the taxpayers aren’t billed a dime.
Some have called it the most extensive downtown revitalization in our country’s history. They just played host to the biggest convention LA’s ever had, and deals are in place to regularly hold the Emmy’s, ESPYs and “American Idol” in the area.
Los Angeles has roughly five times more people than Kansas City, so any comparisons should be taken in proper context. But even so, it’s painfully obvious that so much of what we were told would happen in Kansas City probably never will, while the same company is following through on a project that it plainly deems more important.
If you spend some time in LA’s new crown jewel, it’s hard not to wonder how important Kansas City ever was.