Dive Brief:
- San Diego State University (SDSU) has revealed its $3 billion, 15-year "SDSU Mission Valley" initiative, which will see the redevelopment of a Mission Valley-area stadium site — once home to the former San Diego Chargers — near its main campus, according to The San Diego Union-Tribune.
- University officials said they would not raise student fees or use state money to finance the project. Rather, it would turn to private developers to pay for construction of commercial buildings and housing. SDSU's plans include a 35,000-seat college football stadium that could be expanded to accommodate soccer and professional football, 4,500 residential units for the university and public, retail, office buildings, two hotels and 90 acres of parks and plazas.
- SDSU has not purchased the 166-acre property yet and has a rival in FS Investors of La Jolla, a developer that wants to put a similar, privately financed soccer-based complex on the property. San Diego voters decide on the two proposals next November as long as both groups gather enough signatures to make it onto the ballot.
Dive Insight:
SDSU is backed by some heavyweight San Diego business people through the Friends of SDSU, which has promised to gather enough signatures to put the university's proposal on the ballot, according to the San Diego Reader. The committee has come out against the SoccerCity bid as "nothing more than a land grab" with "land developers seeking vast profits." SoccerCity, however, has questioned the association of a former city manager to Doug Manchester, former San Diego Union-Tribune publisher and developer who made his own proposal for the stadium property.
When it became clear that the Chargers were ditching San Diego for Los Angeles because of taxpayers' refusal to foot part of the bill for a new stadium and convention center, Manchester told the NFL that he had private financing lined up to build a 70,000-seat stadium, construction of which could be fast-tracked to lure the Chargers back or another football team like the Raiders who, at the time, hadn't firmed up their deal for a move to Las Vegas.
Manchester's offer seemed like a viable option for the Raiders for a brief time at the beginning of this year when a major, long-time backer, Sheldon Adelson, withdrew his $650 million investment after reportedly being excluded from the team's lease negotiations with the Las Vegas Stadium Authority. The Raiders, however, were able to secure a loan from Bank of America to make up the difference.
