49ers study alternate stadium plans

By Jason Bennert, Bay City News Service

April 12, 2006

SANTA CLARA (BCN) - The San Francisco 49ers announced Tuesday they are exploring options for building a new stadium that would not involve using $100 million in public money approved by city voters in 1997.

The National Football League team has been trying to replace the aging Monster Park, forever known to longtime fans as Candlestick Park, for more than a decade. In 1997 city voters approved $100 million in bonds to help finance a new stadium complex with an attached shopping mall but the project never got off of the ground due to a number of factors, chiefly the ownership turmoil that led to Eddie DeBartolo selling the team to his sister Denise DeBartolo York and her husband John in 1998 and the economic slowdown brought on by the dotcom bust at the turn of the century.

In January the 49ers began studying a mixed-use project that would include a new stadium and most likely residential units.

The team has partnered with homebuilder Lennar Corp. to explore this option.

"We have been studying a variety of financing options that would allow the team to build a new stadium for our fans and the City without having to tap into the bonds approved by voters,'' 49ers Vice President of Communications Lisa Lang said.

The team and Mayor Gavin Newsom have been criticized this month for asking State Sen. Carol Migden, D-San Francisco, to introduce legislation that would allow housing to be built as part of a stadium project without voter approval. Housing was not mentioned in the 1997 measure.

Lang said the team has no desire to deceive or ignore city voters.

"If the City, with the support of the 49ers, determines that a development concept plan is financially feasible, we don't want there to be any doubt about the consistency of the plan with the voter-adopted ballot measures that were approved in 1997,'' Lang said. "The San Francisco 49ers have no intent, nor would we support, any effort to contravene the will of the voters.''

The team expects a preliminary feasibility study for a new stadium project to be completed this summer.

Copyright © 2006 by Bay City News, Inc. -- Republication, Rebroadcast or any other Reuse without the express written consent of Bay City News, Inc. is prohibited.

####