Ballpark, Stadium and Arena Development: How NOT to do it the Hard Way
November, 2010
The Wall Street Journal Declares End to the Era of Easy Ballparks.
Team owners and public officials might ask: What era? What easy ballparks?
The Giants Win the Pennant! the World Series! Northern Californians are rightly proud of their San Francisco Giants, winners of the 2010 World Series, the franchise's first since moving to San Francisco. The Giants accomplished their magic with a combination of stunning pitching and an eclectic band of everyday players. Overlooked in this remarkable triumph is how close the Giants twice came to leaving San Francisco, once in 1976 (to Toronto) and again in 1992 (Tampa Bay), and how the Giants' extraordinary new stadium was key to "saving" the franchise for San Francisco and Northern California.
AT&T Park, the Giants' home, opened for business as Pacific Bell Park on April 11, 2000, replacing cold, windy and rarely full Candlestick Park. Groundbreaking for the new park took place on November 13, 1997, following overwhelming San Francisco voter approval in March 1996. Since 2000, Giants season attendance has consistently been among the highest in baseball.
What Golden Age? According to a November 6, 2010, Wall Street Journal article, this whole sequence took place during a Golden Age of ballpark construction. According to the Journal, each of the new generation of baseball parks were built in this era, the result of easy money and giddy voters who could barely be restrained from voting "yes" on the latest stadium proposal. But today? Well, bad news says the Journal. Apparently, voters now have a hangover from all this excess and are rejecting proposed new stadiums in droves. And in California, home of the Giants? The state itself has declared an end to ballpark subsidies. Or at least according to the Journal it has.
We like and respect The Wall Street Journal, but it's hard to imagine how one of its articles could have been more wrong on a topic so well covered.
There never was a Golden Age of stadium construction. Not in Baltimore, not in San Diego, not in Seattle, not in Pittsburgh, and not in any other city that built a new ballpark between 1992 (Baltimore Orioles) and 2010 (Minnesota Twins). What the Journal describes as new and novel — for example, a 2009 Florida lawsuit to prevent Sarasota's use of bonds for construction of a minor league ballpark — was actually old hat for just about every city that built a new facility during the Journal's misnamed "Golden Age." Consider just a few examples. In Baltimore, the city finally just gave up. It was the state of Maryland that ended up taking the project over, an experience common to many of the new parks. In San Diego, lawsuits commenced after construction began. And in San Francisco, just about the only thing voters were asked to approve was a waterfront zoning variance. This was because Giants ownership, losers of four previous ballpark elections, had long since given up on a significant public funding component. And the new California moratorium on stadium subsidies announced by the Journal? There was actually no need for a moratorium because California had never funded a ballpark initiative of any kind. Unlike states having just one or two major league teams, California has five — with regional rivalries ensuring that no state money ever gets spent on local ballpark construction. (A San Francisco legislator voting to fund a Dodger Stadium improvement? Hardly.)
Why stadium and ballpark initiatives fail. The key point missed by The Wall Street Journal is why so many stadium proposals became — and continue to become — problematic in the first place. It has far less to do with public funding than it does with good governance and public engagement, or (more likely) the lack of public engagement. This is because despite repeated failures at the ballot box and elsewhere, public officials and team owners almost never correctly interpret what is actually going on.
Voters don't reject great ideas, they reject great ideas that aren't carefully explained to them. When first proposed, ballpark proponents rarely list as a first priority the need to educate the public on why a ballpark is beneficial. It is as if the good public officials of Seattle (or San Diego, or Pittsburgh, or Minnesota) didn't know about any of the troubles in Baltimore (or San Francisco, or Philadelphia, or Milwaukee), and simply moved along as if their new ballpark was the only one that had ever been conceived anywhere in America.
Stadium developers, team owners and public officials take note. In the end, San Francisco got the formula exactly right and the Giants' playbook is one that all cities might consider emulating. In 1992, public support for a new Giants ballpark was explored through a committee jointly appointed by the Mayor and Board of Supervisors. The committee hosted dozens of public meetings throughout San Francisco, and included what was then a daring add-on to new stadium public dialogue: an architectural rendering of what the ballpark might actually look like. When eventually the Giants came back to the voters in 1996, they did so after four years of study and thoughtful engagement with the San Francisco public. The result was AT&T Park — thought by many to be the most beautiful ballpark in the major leagues and one that has transformed a huge swath of San Francisco. Though built without significant public funding, transportation and other critical infrastructure were entirely funded by agencies of the City of San Francisco — responses to voter preferences expressed through public dialogue.
Over on the football side, San Francisco's 49ers apparently got the message. In June 2010, the City of Santa Clara voters approved a new stadium for the team by a landslide — with a significant public funding component. This followed several years of public education funded largely by the team with the full engagement of public officials. (The campaign, of course, included an architectural rendering — now a standard item in virtually all successful stadium campaigns.)
The lesson for stadium developers, team owners and public officials? Engage with leading community members and groups, key channels to the public at large. Convene public meetings, large and small. Teach the public. Let them know why the stadium, ballpark, or arena will be good for them and for their city. Show them where stadiums have worked and admit where they haven't (and why). Ensure excellent cooperation between team leadership and public leadership, both of whom should prepare for a genuine public give and take.
Public officials, team officials and the public itself can indeed end up on the same page — exactly where they must be for ballpark and stadium initiatives to succeed.
How Bullivant can help. Bullivant's Arts, Entertainment and Sports Group can assist clients with all phases of stadium planning and development. Bullivant attorney Christopher J. Bakes, a member of the Arts, Entertainment and Sports Group, chaired San Francisco's Ballpark Advisory Committee, appointed by then-Mayor Frank Jordan and Supervisors Angela Alioto and Doris Ward. Bullivant's Construction, Real Estate and Environmental Group represents owners, contractors and design professionals on public and private construction projects. Bullivant can assist clients with land acquisition, site development, zoning and environmental issues on large, complex projects. Bullivant's Government Relations specialists can assist in navigating through the political maze, with a focus on saving time and money by identifying and working with key decision-makers and community members to gain the necessary political and civic support and approval for large projects.