August 21, 2003
Chargers redux
The San Diego Chargers have offered to eliminate their ticket guarantee - surely you remember the ticket guarantee - if the city lets them build a new stadium and pay for it with tax money. Under the latest proposal, the city would give the team the land under Qualcomm Stadium and its surrounding parking lots, which would be used for both a new stadium and an "urban village" of shops and hotels, with the Chargers keeping tax revenues from the project to pay off the construction tab. (With stadium subsidies a non-starter for most cash-strapped local governments, this sort of broader development with tax kickbacks is becoming a more and more common tactic in the sports biz.) "In this plan, the Chargers are paying for 100 percent of the cost of the stadium," insisted Chargers attorney Mark Fabiani. Replied Chargers task-force member Bruce Henderson: "The taxes are our money. The taxes that the Chargers talk about as paying for all of that, [that] would otherwise go in our general fund."
