Court says Warriors owe Oakland, county
A state appeals court said Tuesday the Golden State Warriors owe Oakland and Alameda County for construction work on the arena where they played for decades before leaving for San Francisco last year. The court did not specify the debt, but it appears to be more than $30 million.
In 1996, 25 years after the NBA team moved from San Francisco to Oakland, the city and county dismantled and redesigned the interior of the 19,000seat arena, now known as Oakland Arena, and issued $140 million in bonds to pay the costs over 30 years.
The agreement allowed the Warriors to leave after 10 years if they paid the debt in full. If they stayed longer than 20 years but acted to “terminate” the agreement before 2027, they were required to continue paying off the bonds, minus profits to the local governments from other uses of the arena.
The Warriors were not bound by contract to remain in Oakland in 2019, however, and their lawyers argued that the team did not “terminate” its agreement with Oakland and Alameda County when it exercised its right to leave. An arbitrator and a San Francisco Superior Court judge disagreed in 2018, and their conclusion was upheld Tuesday by the First District Court of Appeal in San Francisco.
Although “terminate” can be interpreted either way, the Warriors’ decision to depart the arena that the city and county had renovated for their benefit is reasonably understood as “termination by nonrenewal,” Presiding Justice Barbara Jones said in the 30 ruling.
The “key compromise” in the 1996 agreement was a provision “allowing the Warriors to leave after 10 years by paying the renovation debt in full, or after 20 years by making debtservice payments less an offset until 2027,” Jones said. That means any departure, even one allowed by the contract, should be considered a termination that leaves the team responsible for the remaining debt, she said.
Warriors spokesman Raymond Ridder said the team was disappointed by the ruling “but, as we’ve always said, we will fulfill our debt obligation.”