Do free tickets rig the game?
East Bay leaders pay scant attention to rules regarding handing out Warriors passes
OAKLAND — The Golden State Warriors may be the hottest ticket in sports, but for dozens of East Bay politicians, landing free seats is easier than a Stephen Curry layup — and they’re regularly using that precious perk for personal and political capital.
A Bay Area News Group examination found seven public officials each claimed more than $250,000 in complimentary tickets to luxury suites at publicly owned Oracle Arena for Warriors games over the past three seasons as the team rewrote the NBA’s record book.
And now, with the Warriors preparing to tip off a new season with superstar Kevin Durant, calls are mounting to rewrite the rules to restrict how government leaders use the tickets.
The news organization’s review revealed how many of the politicians are doling out tickets, which are supposed to be used for “public purposes,” to friends, family and political
cronies.
Alameda County Supervisor Richard Valle gave four tickets to the Warriors-Cavaliers Game 7 of the NBA Finals — worth $10,000 a pop — to a local artist who had painted a portrait of his wife. Fellow Supervisor Scott Haggerty sent a retired Dublin businessman to whom he owes money to six games over the past three seasons. Tickets in the county’s luxury box for a showdown with the San Antonio Spurs even turned up on eBay — a clear violation of rules that govern how the suites are used.
“Oh my goodness. It is very hurtful,” said the Rev. Harry Williams, a street preacher and author of the book “Straight out of East Oakland” who questions why the seats aren’t more routinely distributed to reward community groups and high-achieving students. “I know very few people can afford to go to a Warriors game.”
Claiming tickets
Overall, public officials from Oakland, Alameda County and the joint authority they formed to run Oracle Arena and neighboring Oakland Coliseum have claimed more than 7,000 tickets to Warriors’ games at a total face value of $7.8 million over the past three seasons, records show.
Local politicians have access to those tickets through clauses in the contracts that allow the Warriors, Raiders and A’s to play at the publicly owned Oakland arena and coliseum; there are three luxury boxes in each facility reserved for their use. State regulations exempt the tickets from the standard political gift limit of $400 annually as long as they’re used for a “public purpose,” and the local agencies have drawn up a broadly defined list of nine allowable uses, such as inspecting the arena, promoting attendance to games, and recognizing local children for doing well in school.
Officials who claim the tickets are required to fill out forms stating the purpose for which they were used, but no one polices the forms to make sure they’re following the rules. The disclosure records show nonprofits, schools and community groups received the public agencies’ free Warriors tickets about 24 percent of the time while politicians and government employees kept the seats for themselves at least 56 percent of the time. Other times it’s impossible to tell where the tickets ended up because the “public purpose” was listed simply as “promote arena attendance” or not listed at all.
“Every month, they (the city) hand us an envelope with a bunch of tickets,” said Oakland Councilman Noel Gallo, who reported taking $22,000 in Warriors tickets. Although Gallo’s forms state he took the tickets in his official capacity to provide oversight of the arena, he said he gave nearly all of them to family members.
“This is certainly a perk for elected officials and city staff, no one can argue otherwise,” said Oakland City Attorney Barbara Parker, who has taken $314,000 worth of tickets the past three years. She said the city’s ticket policy “is worth reviewing.”
The Oakland Ethics Commission is preparing for hearings on the use of free tickets following news reports in the San Francisco Chronicle and KPIXTV during the NBA playoffs that exposed how politicians hoard seats for themselves and are lax at filing disclosure forms. The Bay Area News Group’s analysis took a closer look at the biggest beneficiaries and how they say they’re using the tickets.
Topping the list
Oakland Councilman Larry Reid, who also chairs the authority that runs the arena, topped the list, claiming 356 free tickets — valued at $375,000 — for just about every Warriors game over the past three years. Reid repeatedly reported that he took tickets in his official capacity “to investigate the efficiencies of the operations” at the arena.
But Reid told this newspaper that he barely went to any games, instead giving the tickets to his children, friends and “just regular people who go to church.” No public records show who actually attended. “We haven’t been told we can’t give tickets to relatives,” he said, adding he would ask the authority board to review its policies.
Christopher Dobbins, an authority member and former Oakland school board member, took $343,000 worth of tickets to the authority’s luxury box despite having his own season tickets to the Warriors.
“Wow,” he said when told the value of his public tickets. He said he often switches back and forth between the suite and his seats during games. “I go to see who’s there,” he said.
The news organization’s examination of nearly 2,900 reports on ticket use also found:
Officials rarely use n Warriors tickets to reward student success: Despite city and county policies that allow politicians to give tickets to children as a reward for doing well in school, officials cited “outstanding scholastic achievement” as the justification for handing out tickets just nine times during the past three seasons. Over the same period, they cited themselves as the recipient of the tickets 1,104 times.
Free seats turn up for n sale on eBay: Four tickets to Alameda County’s suite were sold on eBay in March 2014 in violation of rules that prohibit the resale of tickets. It is unclear who was behind the username “thabrassmonkey,” asking $750 for four tickets and parking to “see the game in style” as the Warriors took on the San Antonio Spurs.
State assembly member n took tickets far in excess of state gift limits. Oakland Councilman Abel Guillen gave two tickets worth $1,400 to Assemblyman Tony Thurmond, who doesn’t qualify for the state gift exemption on the tickets because it only covers public officials at agencies that own the suites. “I am extremely embarrassed,” said Thurmond, D-Richmond, who called it an oversight that he wasn’t aware of until informed by this news organization. “I take full responsibility for this,” he said, vowing to pay the difference between the ticket’s face value and the gift limit — about $1,000.
Politicians often give n tickets to campaign donors and sometimes people doing paid work for their campaigns: Guillen gave at least 23 tickets the past two seasons to people who either contributed to or worked for his campaigns for city and state office, claiming the public purpose was to reward community volunteerism, records show. “I can understand why the public could have objections to (the city policy),” he said.
Rewarding donors
Others who used Warriors tickets to reward campaign donors and workers included Oakland council members Dan Kalb, Rebecca Kaplan, Lynnette Gibson McElhaney and Annie Campbell Washington; and Alameda County supervisors Wilma Chan, Nate Miley, Haggerty and Valle.
Valle gave four tickets worth $10,000 each for Game 7 of last season’s NBA Finals to an Oakland artist and county arts commissioner, Andrew Johnstone, who two years earlier had painted a portrait of Valle’s wife and presented it publicly.
“It was just a gift, a lovely gesture, “Johnstone said of the tickets. “We’re family friends. It was out of the blue. I’m not even a huge basketball fan.” Valle did not return repeated phone messages.
“It’s not transparent (and it is) a misuse of a public resource,” said Hanna Callaghan, director of government ethics at Santa Clara University’s Markkula Center for Applied Ethics. “A public official has a public responsibility of loyalty to public.” But all too often tickets “are being used to curry favor,” she said.
Haggerty was accused in a 2013 lawsuit of using free tickets “as a way to pay off personal debts.”
His former chief of staff, James “Chris” Gray, alleged in legal documents that Haggerty gave tickets to people to whom he owed money, and they “would either reduce the debt owed or agree or refrain from collecting on their debts.” The suit was eventually dismissed, and Haggerty said last week he did nothing wrong.
Records show that Haggerty gave 20 tickets to six Warriors games during the past three years to Dublin resident Mel Luna. Haggerty owes Luna between $10,000 and $100,000, according to Haggerty’s financial disclosure forms.
But Luna contradicted Haggerty, saying the loan “was paid off years ago. He don’t owe me a dime.” Both Luna and Haggerty said the tickets weren’t related to the loan. “It’s six games over three seasons,” Haggerty said. “I can’t believe you’re asking about this.”
Some residents, such as Fremont’s Eric Tsai, say more questions should be asked: “This is another example of politicians taking advantage of the system to benefit themselves.”
In San Diego, a new policy for tickets in the city’s suite at Petco Park, home of Major League Baseball’s Padres, allows residents and groups to apply to go to games with a priority of putting kids at the front of the line, said Chris Cate a city councilman there. “It takes the politics out of it,” he said.
Bob Stern, a lawyer who wrote the state ethics law, known as the Fair Political Practices Act, said that law should be changed to define the tickets as gifts to public officials even when they govern a public arena like Oracle. That, he said, “would put an end to it.”
Even as officials reconsider the rules in Oakland, the perk looks like it won’t be around for long: The Warriors are planning to move to a privately financed arena in San Francisco, and the Raiders are closing in on a deal to move to Las Vegas.