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Yes, it's the rallying cry of the coalition pushing for the Warriors' eventual trans-bay exodus from Oakland's Oracle Arena to a $1 billion-plus complex in Mission Bay, but as it hangs, it looks more monarchial, a flag-planting claiming ownership for a faraway king.
"[It is] my legacy project," Lee proclaimed during a waterfront press conference held at Piers 30-32 back in 2012, in reference to the Warriors' move to San Francisco, which has taken some twists and turns: That original waterfront location, on crumbling city-owned piers once offered to Oracle's Larry Ellison in exchange for him hosting the America's Cup here, was eventually scuttled in favor of the Mission Bay site, land purchased from Salesforce.com (whose CEO's name happens to grace the new UCSF hospital in the neighborhood).
The path to achieving that legacy before the 2019-2020 season looks clear now, too; Lee recently bought the support of UCSF Medical Center at Mission Bay, one of the last remaining holdouts to the plan, with a $10 million annual fund dedicated to "controlling the flow of traffic in the neighborhood," ostensibly squashing concerns over the gridlocked nightmare — nevermind patients' heightened stress levels due to the game day commotion — of the Warriors and Giants playing in town simultaneously. (UCSF scientists project that 11 "key" intersections will be — and I'm paraphrasing here — quite fucked during game nights; subsequently, the Board of Supervisors added another $55 million to the coffers for "transit infrastructure.")
In addition to the arena, the Warriors' grand plan calls for 3.2 acres of public space, 100,000 square feet of retail space, 580,000 square feet for offices, and 950 parking spots. "[Ticket] prices have yet to be determined," reads the FAQ section of the plan's website at NBA.com, before trying to quash fears of being priced out by stating they "know Warriors games are special, and we want all of our fans to continue to enjoy that experience."
This Warriors "Bridge to SF" plan — like the $357 million AT&T Park before it, and the adjacent Mission Park Development project — is being funded by private money. That is to say, rich folks. Which: Yes! Of course! That's the way it should be! The rich people who own these teams should be paying for the places in which they play. Enough studies have shown that cities get screwed when public funds are siphoned off for what's essentially a private business HQ masquerading as a bastion of local pride; in 2012, Judith Grant Long, a Harvard urban planning professor, estimated that U.S. taxpayers lost $10 billion more than originally forecasted in stadium deals. So, private over public investment is all well and good. The bad is a bit more murky.
But when a mayor claims his "legacy project" is a sports arena, and that arena's being funded by big business, something seems off, doesn't sit right, leaves one thick splinter in the old tush. In other words, an elected official wants his constituents to look back upon his time in office and consider the moment when he decided to allow a business to conduct their business on a large swath of valuable land as his sacred and epochal civic contribution.
One of the political neophytes opposing Lee in the past mayoral election, Amy Farah Weiss, tabbed at this misaligned compass by claiming her own "legacy project" would be an "eco-district that integrates [...] current and future buildings, programming, and job placement." That vision seems more fitting of a proper city servant. Then again, Lee does look fetching in his Giants orange-colored blazer.
(The Giants' Mission Bay real estate development is interesting, too. Essentially, it's being billed as a way for the team to hedge its bets. If the Giants have a lousy season, or if ticket/concession sales dip, the ballclub's budget won't necessarily be lopped with it because, oh look, here's another source of income. The development was sold as badly needed housing, with a "no one's doing anything with the land anyway" shrug: which, fair enough. But the approval also gives team ownership carte blanche to do what they will with waterfront property. While there was a great stink made about the plan calling for 33 percent of its 1,000 to 1,950 residential units reserved as "affordable" for low- and middle-income households, those are vague terms and wide-ranging numbers. More importantly, the plan merely says the city would "encourage" ownership to hit those goals: which, c'mon. In any case, 74 percent of city voters saw enough to approve Proposition D last November, so this is moving forward.)
Across the bay, the stingy ownership of the Raiders and A's has been testing the resolve of new Oakland Mayor Libby Schaaf during her first year in office. She's long been on the record guaranteeing public funds won't be used to construct stadiums to save the Raiders/A's from their current decrepit, yet lovable, digs at the publicly-owned O.co Coliseum. But after A's owner Lew Wolff's repeated attempts to relocate to San Jose, and just before the Raiders' stadium lease ran up, Schaaf changed her tune. In a presentation with top NFL brass in New York last November, Schaaf opened up the possibility that "public bonds" could be used to finance the stadium. (It should be noted that, during the NFL owners' meetings this past January, Schaaf declared, once again, that no public funds will be used on stadiums, while simultaneously touting a new waterfront ballpark for the A's at a Port of Oakland container terminal.)
That New York meeting wasn't good enough for Raiders owner Mark Davis, who still applied to relocate his team to L.A., before the ghost of his father, legendary former Raiders owner Al Davis, apparently scared the other NFL owners into chilling refusal. (It remains to be seen where the Raiders play their next home game; latest news has Mark Davis flaunting previously-purchased land in San Antonio for a possible move.) Meanwhile, Wolff presumably continued his days relaxing in a gold-encrusted barcalounger in his spacious L.A. home, waiting for his stadium lease to expire in 2024, or for Schaaf or her successor to cough up some of those sweet public funds, and also laughing, just so much laughing in the Wolff household, how could this man not.
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