Schaaf says Oakland not to blame for Raider move
The happy-feet Raiders are nearing the end of their most recent stay in Oakland, and who is to blame for owner Mark Davis moving his team to Las Vegas? Not Oakland, says Mayor Libby Schaaf. I had a recent phone conversation with Schaaf, who is up for re-election Tuesday and is considered the favorite. The interview was regarding the A’s and their search for a site for a new ballpark in Oakland. When our A’s discussion ended I said, “Can I ask you a Raiders question?”
“They should not have traded Khalil Mack!” Schaaf shot back. “The Curse of the Mack! I think the Raiders are suffering from the Mack Curse.”
Schaaf, who was elected mayor in 2014, was born and raised in Oakland and said she has always cheered for the local teams.
Through her first three years in office, Schaaf tried to negotiate with the Raiders on a new stadium at the Coliseum site. In April last year, the Raiders announced their NFL-sanctioned decision to move to Las Vegas.
My question to the mayor: Do you think the Raiders made a good-faith effort to stay in Oakland?
“Hell, no!” Schaaf shot back. “Unequivocally
no. There was no good faith there at all.”
So owner Mark Davis seemed dead set on moving his team to Vegas?
“Dead set. No effort whatsoever. I can’t speak to the time before I was mayor, and I want to recognize that the Raiders, I think when I came in as mayor there was a lot of years of legitimate frustration that they were feeling, (but) during my time as mayor, no good-faith efforts were made. No.”
Every plan through the years has been complicated by the fact that the Coliseum land is owned jointly by the city and county, and by the fact that the Raiders and A’s showed little or no interest in working with one another. Also, any deal, including proposals with outside developers, would have required using part of the site for commercial development, which Davis opposed.
But Schaaf was aggressive in pursuing a deal. Between the time she took office in January 2015 and Davis’ final decision to move to Las Vegas in January 2016, the mayor brought plans and ideas to the table, but the Raiders were not eager participants.
I asked Schaaf whether it bothered her that she and Oakland officials have been cast in the role of villains by Davis and some of his team’s fans, for not trying hard enough to keep the team.
“You know, honestly, I have been pleasantly surprised,” Schaaf said. “I think that actually the residents of Oakland have been refreshingly supportive and understanding that the city took a principled stand, and while we were all sad that we lost our beloved team, we did so in principle. I actually have been encouraged by the amount of understanding, and in many ways support, that I got from how I handled the matter.”
Schaaf probably is getting even more support these days as the Raiders are in free fall, with a 1-7 record and head coach Jon Gruden presiding over what looks more each day like a complete rebuild, the benefits of which won’t be much good to Oakland fans, since the Raiders are likely to move out after this season when their Coliseum lease expires.
I mentioned to Schaaf that Davis said a few years ago that he would be happy to build a no-frills stadium in Oakland for under a billion dollars, and now his team’s share of the new Vegas stadium costs will probably approach what he would have spent to stay in Oakland.
Schaaf said, “How we were going to finance the new stadium in Oakland was through more development on that giant-surface parking lot, which he refused to give up a single parking space, and I understand that they’re not going to have the parking spaces at the Vegas stadium.
“So, again, I think there is ample evidence that there was not a good-faith effort to stay. Because the deal that we presented with Ronnie Lott was an absolutely viable, shovel-ready deal that the Raiders walked away from.” Did that shock her? “Yes, yes. I shouldn’t say I was completely shocked, because the Raiders had stonewalled for the entire time that I was the mayor, but the NFL allowed them to do that, when their own (league) policies state that they are going to give the home market every chance to be successful. That was surprising, and that was very disappointing.”
The Raiders, through team president Marc Badain, declined to respond to Schaaf ’s comments.
Multiple sources told me that Davis rejected any plan or proposal at the Coliseum site if that plan called for one less parking space than is currently there.
The Coliseum site has about 8,000 parking spaces. The new Las Vegas Stadium will have fewer than 3,000 spaces on site, according to the Las Vegas Sun. There will be 14,000 spaces off site, with most fans shuttling to the stadium.
The Lott proposal, backed by a predominantly African American group of investors and initially given NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell’s stamp of approval, would have set aside 15 acres for the A’s if they chose to stay at the Coliseum site. The group planned to build hotels and restaurants on the site. The city would kick in $200 million for infrastructure. The Raiders did not actively participate in those negotiations.
Oakland officials have said that before the Raiders announced their move to Las Vegas, the city had not been able to meet directly with Davis for more than a year.
In a Dear John letter to Oakland, Goodell said a key sticking point was Oakland’s refusal to tell the A’s to take a hike.
Davis has said that what finalized his decision to move to Vegas was Oakland tripling the Raiders’ rent at the Coliseum in early 2016, after the league shot down the Raiders’ attempt to move to Los Angeles.
So the team owner who was aggressively attempting to move his team to L.A. was angered by the perceived disloyalty of Oakland and its mayor.