Stadium project cost hits $12 billion
The A’s proposed ballpark and development project at Howard Terminal still faces numerous hurdles, but if it does come to fruition, the price tag for the massive endeavor is expected to be $12 billion, according to documents the team released Friday.
The A’s also revealed they will privately fund the 35,000-seat ballpark construction at a $1 billion cost, according to the term sheets.
The full project development will expand around Howard Terminal and Jack London Square and include 3,000 units of affordable housing,1.5 million square feet of offices and 270,000 square feet of retail space. The project also includes a 3,500-person indoor performance center and a 400room hotel.
The overall cost includes $450 million in community benefits and $955 million in projected general fund revenues. In return, the city of Oakland would allocate $855 million for infrastructure improvements. The A’s also included a non-relocation agreement with Oakland, which means the organization will not engage in any potential relocation outside of the city while the agreement is in place.
In a letter to the city with the term agreement, the A’s and president Dave Kaval asked the Oakland City Council to vote on the project.
“We respectfully ask that the Oakland City Council take a vote on our project before summer recess,” Kaval said in a Tweet along with a link to a petition.
Mayor Libby Schaaf, who recently proclaimed her support for the project, appears poised to negotiate with the A’s on the amount of public financing involved.
“The City is willing to bear its resources to help make this vision a reality; however, today’s proposal from the A’s appears to request public investment at the high end for projects of this type nationwide,” read a statement from Schaaf spokesperson Justin Berton that confirmed receipt of the proposal.
The statement declared the city is still “fully committed” to collaborating with the A’s to bring a public-private funding plan to the city council this year.
Beyond the mayor’s office, there are still many obstacles facing the A’s as they continue their decades-long quest to finally leave the Coliseum site, where they have called home since the franchise moved from Kansas City in 1968. The facility is one of the most outdated in the league, and in recent years has received nearly as much attention for its plumbing failures and other shortcomings as the success of the team on the field. Tuesday’s game, the A’s 10th win in a row, was delayed by more than 20 minutes when the bank of lights above left field went out.
Atop the list of potential hurdles is a 6,000-page Environmental Impact Report that is up for public comment until Tuesday.
In a Planning Commission hearing on Wednesday, the East Oakland Stadium Alliance — a coalition of workers and labor organizers on the waterfront concerned with Howard Terminal’s impact on jobs — asked for an extension to review the document and several comments criticized the draft EIR for lacking detailed information on affordable housing and how the project would impact the surrounding area. Oakland granted a 15-day extension on April 8.
There is also the issue about access to the ballpark. Unlike the Coliseum site, there is no BART station to serve the area. And there are no parking lots in the most recent construction plan.
According to reports, the A’s want to retain the rights to develop the Coliseum site, which until two years ago also was the home to the Warriors and the Raiders.
In the petition, Kaval noted that, “This project means more than just a ballpark for us and Oakland . ... We’ve hosted 200+ community meetings as part of a first-of-its-kind race & equity-driven community benefits process. Our community work is in every corner of the Town: education, youth sports, food insecurity, homelessness, environmental justice, and more. We are prepared to make even more significant investments in Oakland, for the residents & community.”
While Schaaf may press the issue on the financing, she has struck a similar tone as Kaval’s in pitching the park.
“I want the A’s to remain in Oakland forever. A prominent new home on the waterfront will help keep them here and keep their business a financially viable one well into the future,” she wrote in an op-ed earlier this month.
“Major League Baseball has an excellent track record for creating beautiful new ballparks that reinvigorate city centers and spawn new neighborhoods, from San Francisco to Baltimore; we want no less for Oakland.”