Brick by brick, we're building it up

So things have changed around here a little bit...

I'm still getting some ... extra pages, we'll call them ... set up elsewhere. But this is the bulk of it. Some stuff may stop working randomly over the next 72, but getting around the site should be fine. There are things to look forward to in the near future if you're a member of Digg or Facebook.

In the meantime, here's the Union-Tribune article on the Chargers vs. Sanders, as well as Fabiani's letter.

Chargers getting caught up in mayoral race

The Chargers are letting the public know they favor no candidate in the San Diego mayoral race between incumbent Jerry Sanders and Steve Francis in the wake of a controversial phone banking comment.

According to the Chargers, Sanders' campaign has told voters through the telecommuncations group that Francis has attempted to Republican special interest groups. Chargers owner Alex Spanos is included in that list. Fabiani called these actions "dishonest and hypocritical."

Chargers special counsel Mark Fabiani sent a letter to the Sanders campaign, asking them to desist with the calls that are "deliberately designed to leave voters with the false impression that ... the Chargers support your challenger, Steve Francis."

Francis' campaign is mainly self-funded.

According to Fabiani, Sanders approached the Chargers in late April asking for donations, to which the Chargers declined, claiming they were not supporting any candidates in the race.
Spanos has given millions to Republicans over the last few decades. Since 1980, he has given more than $6.7 million to Republican or special interest groups, including $20,000 to the California Republican party in 2007.

Site Redesign Coming This Week

All the new stuff is coming in this week. Things will start looking different as early as Wednesday. I have a couple new features coming that you all are really going to like.

We'll also hve some coverage of this Port Commission's decisions regarding the bay front Master Plan. You can read more about it here for now.

The enivonmental impact report is very interesting to go over, but the commission makes it clear they have accepted the demand for development in the region. There is a notable lack of stadium talk, and based on conversations with the commission this is because the group doesn't like to deal in what they consider to be hypotheticals. If there isn't a proposal going to vote or an application filled out, they don't want to deal with it.

Chula Vista cops ready for stadium task

Can law enforcement take on a new stadium?
By Brandon Stone
San Diego Stadium Watch

The gruff voice of public information officer Bernard Gonzales confidently says what over 212,000 Chula Vistans need to know. Can the Chula Vista police department patrol and control if there’s a new stadium in their town?

“I don’t think there any question that we can do that,” Gonzales said.

It is a question that hasn’t been addressed as much as others since Chula Vista began its talks with the San Diego Chargers. Lost in the shuffle of taxes, environment and feasibility is safety. Stadiums attract many things – tourism, events and commercial interests are just the tip of the iceberg – but the core of all of it is people. The problem is that it doesn’t designate which people it attracts. For every Charger fan that would come through a Chula Vista turnstile to cheer for their team, another could come in with a knife or a gun – or some thing even worse.

“We have discussed various options in very general terms with the City of Chula Vista,” Chargers special counsel Mark Fabiani said, “but since we don't even have a final site at this point, those discussions have not moved beyond the very preliminary stages. These issues are very important for host cities, of course, and they deserve careful consideration.”

The department has been part of the city council’s talks with the Chargers, but hasn’t been primarily focused on.

“I don’t think we were the first people on the list to be informed,” Gonzales said, “but certainly during meeting with higher-ups at the city the police department was included in the loop. I’m sure early on in the process the question had to have been asked – what do you think about this stadium idea? Could the police department handle it? City leaders have certainly asked that before.”

Despite its recent financial woes, Chula Vista is still a city on the move. Population has rocketed and homes that now contribute to the city’s budget problems were once booming with new renters and owners. The police department had that in mind when building their current station in 2004. That same station will be depended on to strategize in case a stadium comes to the city.

“The new police station was built for expansion into the future,” Gonzales said. “It took a police department that was crammed into a small 50,000 square foot facility and placed that department into a 150,000 square foot facility. … Chula Vista is growing, and the building was meant to serve the community for the next 25 to 30 years, if not longer.”

Protection and safety in stadiums are nothing new. According to crime studies, over half of U.S. football stadiums are located in high-risk crime neighborhoods. More and more stories of violence in parking lots come out. Traffic accidents on highways and streets go up.

The people who run Qualcomm Stadium battle this every season. The stadium features a long list of rules for those that come into the area, and the stadium is policed by a mix of San Diego police on foot, car and horseback along with Elite Security and the Highway Patrol keep the area as safe as they can manage. San Diego Police’s Special Events Unit leads the stadium effort. Lt. Dan Chrisman of Special Events declined to be interviewed for this reporting, noting that the main role of his group is to maintain traffic flow.

Crime inside the Qualcomm Stadium parking lot isn’t a small thing. According to police records on Sundays from September 2007 to November 2007, there is a spike in crime between game days and other days. On September 9, for example, 90 incidents were recorded. They included violations for traffic, public drunkenness, and narcotics. Compare that with September 16, where only four incidents were reported. Of the 466 total incidents recorded, all but 19 were during Chargers games.

In Chula Vista, protection on this scale has not been done on a regular basis. Chula Vista police serve one of the 100 biggest cities in the nation as well as indirectly police visitors and aliens from the Mexican border, but the department has never covered a professional stadium the way one on the bay front or east side would ask them to do. Cities in comparable size to Chula Vista that host major venues are New Orleans, Lubbock and Orlando, and only Lubbock has favorable trends as of late. A bonus for the department is that Chula Vista police chief Rick Emerson hails from Pasadena, where he dealt with UCLA games and the Rose Bowl each year.

No matter what information is out there, the department is still dealing with the unknown.

“Until you see a plan,” Gonzales said, “until you see a stadium, until you get an agreement, it’s hard to react and respond to these things and it’s hard to have an opinion about it because all you have is an idea. You don’t have anything that says ‘Here’s where it’s going to go, here’s what its going to look like, here’s what we’re going to do with it, and here’s how your services are going to be needed.’ Until then, it’s all speculation.”

Even with speculation, organizations still need to be prepared. Officers still need to be trained on how to handle the situation, enforcement has to work on communication skills, and equipment has to be ordered. Everything must fit with the needs of a building that attracts as many as 100,000 people on a given Sunday.

Some of the forces that could be used for Charger games include a special task force sent out by the police department for traffic control while the others work the surface streets like normal.

“If you put a stadium next to a trolley station, it’s going to reduce the traffic … that would be entering the stadium,” Gonzales said. “If you put it out in the middle of a field somewhere and you’ve got to build roads to it that would have a different type of impact.”

The Chargers would still have to plan on hiring their own paid private security. According to Gonzales, it would be up to the Chargers to control the stadium internally.

“The stadium would be under the private ownership of whoever decides to build it,” Gonzales said. “It’s not owned by the police department, so we would not handle it.”

If the stadium ends up on the bay front, then agencies such as the Harbor Patrol, Coast Guard and even U.S. Customs could come into play. The Port of San Diego controls protection there, and currently has vessel patrol for wildlife, a vehicle team, a bike team and mobile command vehicles.

A media relations employee for the Port of San Diego withdrew comment, only saying that they would work within the Chula Vista Bayfront Master Plan to protect the area.

“If the stadium is in our jurisdiction, we become the primary law enforcement agency,” Gonzales said. “Everybody in the county communicates over the same radio system, so communication is not a major issue. We have good relationships with every law enforcement agency in the county. Building those bridges in terms of communicating on a major event isn’t something that is difficult.”

Even if Chula Vista has the time, resources and power to keep a stadium in line, there is still the money issue. With jobs on the line all over Chula Vista, the police department may not be able to afford putting in the funds to upgrade or create service.

The Chargers promised Chula Vista a privately funded stadium. They did not promise funds for protecting it.

“Obviously, teams that have needs that require the local police department,” Gonzales said. “They pay for those needs to mitigate the impact of the city. So we would expect that the same type of things would happen here.”

Fabiani did not commit to funding law enforcement, but did endorse the importance of “evaluate carefully the public safety cost implications” when building a stadium.

“Generally speaking, in the NFL teams and cities split costs in some form or fashion,” Fabiani said. “In some places, for example, teams pay for all services inside the stadium premises and cities provide services outside the stadium.”

Gonzales thinks the police department is ready to take up that task.“The police department doesn’t create its needs,” Gonzales said, “it responds to what the city requires … we respond to what the city needs. …We respond and we adjust. And that’s what we would do with the stadium.”

WatchCast - Podcast #1

The first edition of WatchCast is finally here! However - due to some server hosting problems, it has to be downloaed rather than streamed.

You can get the show here.

In the show, there's a rundown of headlines, some delicious commentary on the state of news media, and some interviews I did with attendees of Chargers mini-camp over the weekend. Hope you enjoy it!

Be back later this week for a little chat about police and stadium protection. Keep safe out there.

Dean Spanos talks about the stadium

Chargers.com has an interview with team president Dean Spanos concerning the team's preparation for the fall and stadium progress.

Spanos says that management is "concentrating all of [its] efforts on the last possible San Diego County sites." He notes the financing study, which he says will come in the next two to three months. He noted the Gaylord site as most critical to the stadium's viability.

Here's part of his comment addressing his relationship with Ed Roski:

“Ed Roski is a friend of mine. Our fathers were in the development business together, and we’ve talked about various development projects over the years. Ed has told me about his plans for a Los Angeles stadium. And I’ve told Ed that the Chargers’ focus continues to be in San Diego. We’ve tried very hard to work something out here.”

A Couple Of Links & The May Rundown

Happy end of April to all the stadium watchers out there. Let's get to the quick links.

-A Nick Canepa column details the links between Ed Roski and Chargers ownership.

Last week, when Roski proposed building an $800 million NFL stadium on 600 acres of pre-zoned land he owns in the lovely City of Industry – about 20 miles east of L.A. – I wondered aloud: “What's in it for him?”
...And, of course, the Chargers immediately came to mind, because they're looking for new digs and can take off following the 2008 season. Do not rule that out.

-Another SDUT article shows a link between campaign finaning and bay front development. Alfred and James Baldwin, developers from Orange County, have spent over $11,000 on various campaigns. The stadium link comes with eastern Chula Vista, a place where the team would most likely build homes and commercial space to help fund a bay front stadium. Baldwin companies have special rights to that land, and would collect major funds if the Chargers built in the area.

Baldwin money has gone to three main people - Mayor Sanders and two candidates for City Council, April Boling and Carl DeMaio. The two have similar plans and backgrounds, and both are not critical of Sanders' policies. Do the Baldwins favor these two with Sanders because they may not want a new stadium in Mission Valley? There are other factors. Both the candidates largely favor remaking infrastructure, something that the Baldwin companies can work on. There is certainly more to this, and Stadium Watch will have it.

Now, let's talk about May. There are a lot of things going on this month - and SDSW has a lot of plans.

On May 4th, SDSW will be at Chargers Mini-Camp in Kearny Mesa taking opinions from Charger fans about the negotiations. This will lead to SDSW's first podcast, coming sometime during that week.

May 6th is the scheduled date for the Port Commission to meet with San Diego Community Solutions about the 10th Avenue Marine Terminal. While SDSW won't be at the meeting, there will certainly be coverage of what takes place.

For May 9th, there will be a feature on the Chula Vista Police Department. Is law enforcement ready and able to control a stadium on the bay front? What steps will they have to take? Does stepping up the force mean more taxes for Chula Vistans?

Finally, the last week of May will come with a new look for SDSW. New colors, fonts, bars, links - we're changing everything for the summer. Stay tuned.

A new stadium to keep watch of?

San Diego isn't the only place in Southern California trying to get a stadium built.

Stephen Roski, a billionaire developer, announced yesterday his plans to build an $800 million stadium in Eastern Los Angeles.

Here is the official report from ESPN and the San Diego Union-Tribune.

I've seen ambition for stadiums in Los Angeles and San Diego over the years, but this is the only time I've seen these ambitions come to fruition. Usually, a random developer expresses plans for a major outfit that will change a city's economy, but they either aren't serious enough or realistic enough.

This is different. Roski means business. He's got the location, he owns it, he wants it.

I spoke to Chargers special counsel Mark Fabiani this morning, and while he expressed that the team stays out of what other cities are doing (a wise choice, considering the smallest leak could do unfixable harm to the Chula Vista project), he did comment of the links that have been made between Roski and the Spanos family.

"The Roski and Spanos families have been friends for many years," Fabiani said, "and Ed Roski and Dean Spanos speak often about potential non-sports real estate deals. During the course of those conversations Ed has explained his stadium concept to Dean. So we know something about Roski’s stadium plans, but we are continuing to focus our efforts on our remaining two options in Chula Vista and working as hard as we can to make something happen there."

So can we turn this into a conspiracy theory? Certainly, but I'd press the brake button on it. This stadium will be Roski's privately funded project, which means he'll want a major return on the investment if he can bring the NFL back to Los Angeles. To me, this would mean a major stake in whatever team came. The Chargers have been owned by Alex Spanos since 1984, and I'm not sure if they are willing to just hand a large piece of a team valued at $826 million in September 2007, especially when that team is so close to stability in the region for the next 50 to 75 years. Would Spanos make more money by selling a piece, paying outrageous rent for Roski's stadium, or staying put?

Spanos has already spent $10 million to fund this project, and will have to spend much more along the way. Would he eschew money spent for this opportunity?

What's interesting about the Forbes value chart is that 12 percent of the team's value comes from outdated Qualcomm Stadium, totaling $100 million. The Chargers have sold out their last 30 home games, which is over 3 years worth of time, but still fall back in revenue. Here are the stadium values of top five teams in overall value:

Dallas: $237 million, 16 percent
Washington: $362 million, 25 percent
New England: $231 million, 19 percent
Houston: $178 million, 17 percent
Philadelphia: $180 million, 17 percent

Make whatever sense of that you want, but four of those fives teams had stadiums either built or completely remodeled since 2000, and the other (Dallas) moves into a new facility in Arlington next year that is expected to generate even more money than the Irving site.

Loss of Chargers leaves hole in Mission Valley’s heart

With the Chargers on the way out, valley residents face an uncertain future
By Brandon Stone
San Diego Stadium Watch

Nestled in the center of the city, Mission Valley operates like the heart of San Diego.
Interstates 5, 8 and 15 act as blood vessels, carrying cells of cars through the city. State Route 163 acts like a right ventricle to Fashion Valley Mall’s atrium, and Westfield Mission Valley the left side of the heart. The cycle continues each day, giving life to the region.

And in this heartland, Qualcomm Stadium represents the pulse.

With the Chargers ready to jettison the center of the city for a new stadium in Chula Vista, questions remain about the stability of Mission Valley with no professional teams left to play there. The area lost the Padres to Petco Park downtown in 2003, and stands to lose the Chargers within the next five years.

Economically, does the reality of losing regular business in the fall cause businesses to straddle back their plans? And what does it do for the 18,000 people that call Mission Valley home? How does the loss change the spirit of Mission Valley?

Living in the shadow

Blending sports and economics is what Chris Dean, the 46-year-old manager of Oggi’s Pizza, deals with each day.

“Football Sundays are huge, regardless of whether the Chargers are here or not,” Dean, who has been managing for three years, said. “They're really huge if the Chargers are here.”

Fans from all corners come to the sports bar at Fenton Marketplace, located directly west of Qualcomm Stadium. Game days transform what is normally a quiet area into another section of the Qualcomm parking lot.

“It's just a lot of fun,” Dean said. “The atmosphere is great and everything. It's just a really fun day. When they moved on to the championship last year ... people just knocking chairs, jumping up and down.”

“There are a lot of people walking around, but everyone's real cool usually,” Mindy Hernandez, a 22-year-old manager at next-door Taco Del Mar said. “There's no rowdiness most of the time.”

It isn’t all a game for Fenton Marketplace. Traffic problems consume the mall on business days as people leave their cars there to walk over for games.

“The parking is a nightmare,” Dean said, “but that's anywhere when you're around a stadium. We have security out in the parking lot to make sure people aren't parking here and walking over to the game.”

“On game days, the parking lot is insane,” 23-year-old Alena Rivas of Ultra Beauty Supply & Salon said. “It's absolutely full … Afterwards, traffic is a problem, but the business it beings into this whole area is worth it.”

Rivas, who has been managing for two years, said her business profits from women who come out on Sundays both for games and for hairdos.

“A lot of women do come here on Sundays and get their hair done and make comments that their husbands or boyfriends are at home watching the game,” Rivas said.

Businesses hope that the one-time passerby feels an attraction to come back. That’s the strategy that fuels McGregor’s Grill, a sports bar to the east of the stadium along San Diego Mission Road.

“That's how we made our name,” manager Paul Bernhardt said. “People would come around because they got to know us and enjoy us. Even when its not sports season, they come back. … They come, they leave their money, and they go.”

“I think the spirit's the big thing,” Dean said. “…As far as financially, obviously other than game days I don't think it'll be a huge burden on us, but [then there’s] the spirit. We're going to miss not having them around.”

Rocking the house

It’s one thing to shop or work next to a stadium. Try living next to it.

One housing complex, Mission Terrace on San Diego Mission Road, knows the experience. They offer affordable housing for families. The complex has been there since 1994.

“It's not bad,” 43-year-old community manager Yvette Santiago said. “You get used to it after so many years here. I don't have any issues with it, to tell you the truth.”

Housing has become one of Mission Valley’s largest concerns in the last couple of decades. Population has swelled, with the area seeing a 43 percent upswing from 2000 to 2007. Due to this, housing units have gone up 40 percent. Mission Valley has also become the ideal place for young families. More than 5000 residents are between 30 and 40 years old, and there are more children under five than any other demographic of 18-and-under in the area. Young professionals who come to Mission Valley to work want to live there as well.

A new complex, Quarry Falls, is currently under construction. It plans to expand as the area allows it to, and will be home to two things Mission Valley does not have – a public school as well as a park that isn’t made of concrete. Qualcomm Stadium is Mission Valley’s only official park land.

With the housing crunch already in effect, developers are looking for any edge to get people to buy in. A stadium could be the difference – but if there’s no future for that stadium, it provides no hook. The city will not commit to any long-term plans for the site if the Chargers are gone, leaving the housing industry with no answers.

“Other people may start losing because they ... can [use it] to advertise their building easier,” Santiago said.

Several complexes, including Padre Gardens, Portofino and Monte Vista either declined to comment or did not immediately return requests.

There is already a Charger culture in Mission Valley for new buyers to embrace. If they just step out of their homes, they’re already in it.

“It's really convenient for them to get to the games,” Santiago said. “All they have to do is walk over there.”

Santiago, who has lived in Mission Terrace for 11 years, said that there has not been any vandalism on the property as far as she knew. She also said that the building hasn’t sold off extra parking spaces, a practice that is common for apartment buildings and commercial complexes in San Diego and other cities. Traffic is also not a major concern.

“There [are] traffic issues, but not really bad,” Santiago said. “If you know how to go in and out of here, it's easy.”

What isn’t easy, however, is adjusting to Mission Valley without a team.

“Business around here is going to go down so much,” Santiago said, “because they attract a lot of business here. You have all these business around the street, and they're crowded whenever there's a game, so it's going to be hard.”

A spot in the circle

Not every fan that enters the turnstiles at Qualcomm Stadium is a Chargers fan. Outside fans have always earmarked San Diego as a place to see their teams on the road while squeezing in a family vacation. Charger fans take great offense to being called ‘fair-weathered’ based on the high levels of visitors in the seats each game, citing the vacation factor as the reason why.

Visitors have to have somewhere to stay. That’s when they look out west to Hotel Circle.

Charles Holladay, 46, has been managing the Ramada Inn for six years. The Ramada has 182 rooms in their four floor facility. Rooms cost between $99 and $199, with the highest spike at $299.

“During the regular season, we tend to get quite a bit of business from the visiting team's supporters,” Holladay said. “At least 50 or 75 rooms on most weekends, especially more as it gets into the October, November and December time frame and it get colder back east.”

Hotel Circle’s roots come from the major development of Mission Valley in the 60s and 70s. Mission Valley Center was built in 1961 and is known as the spark for the valley’s present-day look. The Ramada was built in 1965. Qualcomm Stadium was built in 1967.

Holladay said that visiting fans aren’t very rowdy. That doesn’t mean there isn’t trash talking.
“When I come in on a Sunday morning, I'm wearing all my colors,” Holladay said. “They're excited to see their team. If you lived in Pittsburgh and it was December, you'd be pretty happy to be in San Diego too.”

Holladay was quite frank about the situation.

“The Chargers will probably leave the Qualcomm site, and I won't get the same amount of business that I currently enjoy every year,” Holladay said. “It's a slower time of year and its nice to have that business. In December, when it’s slow as far as tourism is concerned, a Charger home game means I'm going to sell out for a couple of nights.”

The final heartbeat

The pulse of the valley is pumping its last drops of blood. Mission Valley waits for its future to be officially decided.

“I feel a lot of people who live around this are really appreciate that the Chargers do play across the street from them and they like it,” Hernandez said. “A lot of Charger fans do come here even if the Chargers aren't playing, but they know it's near the stadium and they can come here and watch the away games.”

“In a rational political environment,” Chargers special counsel Mark Fabiani said, “it would seem likely that the City would decide to tear down the stadium, relieve itself of its annual and deferred maintenance obligations, and try to do something socially useful or economically useful with the site. But these have hardly been rational times at City Hall, and San Diego has a history of debating troublesome issues for many years.”

Some expect to see new housing projects like Quarry Falls. Others expect another mall. Whether the market can hold either is questionable.

“Economy wise, I'm sure that they're going to replace that, Dean said. “I've heard they're going to build retail, all that kind of stuff.”

“I don't think anyone would be too surprised if after the Chargers depart Qualcomm that the stadium in Mission Valley will sit empty as the discussion about what to do with it drones on,” Fabiani said.

Mission Valley will find a new pulse. Fashion Valley is almost done building their extension. Westfield Mission Valley continues to be popular. Quarry Falls will give residents local identity. The Chargers’ impact will always be felt on the valley, however. The end of the stadium’s life with 40 years of games doesn’t end 40 years of memories.

“We're sorry financially to see them leave us because they're a big bonus for us,” Dean said. “But Mission Valley is the place. Chula Vista will be fine; I guess … it's just too bad they couldn't have worked a deal out over here. That's the way it goes.”

Slideshow of Mission Valley locations

What's your price?

A new poll on ESPN.com's Page 2 asks how much money you'd take in return for your team leaving town, how much you'd pay to keep them in town, and many other piercing questions about how people operate with sports in mind.

The question key for this blog is #5:
5) Your local government agrees to build a new sports complex to keep your favorite team in town. But spending on roads and education will be cut. Are you OK with this?

With 17,000 votes cast so far, 52% said they'd be OK with it. Makes me wonder what a group of Chula Vistans would answer...