Everything within the yellow border (except Angels Stadium itself) was to be given away to Angels owner Arte Moreno for 66-99 years, for a lease of as little as $1/year. Until today, the City of Anaheim didn’t even know what the land was worth. Now, the report has come in. (Image from the report by Waronzof Associates, leaked early to the City’s blogger.)
The parting gift from former City Manager Marcie Edwards to the City of Anaheim was to arrange for a qualified and professional appraisal of the 154-acre lot surrounding Angels Stadium. The development rights to this parcel have been slated to be given to Angels owner Arte Moreno, as part of a package with the new lease on the Stadium itself, for a nominal fee. (The tentative “placeholder” figure was $1/year, but even a price many times that would not necessarily change the fundamentals.) Moreno would then be able to assign (think of it as being like a sublease) this land to developers — he isn’t one himself — for at least 66 years and possibly more like 99 years.
The City, by its own omission, had no idea what the land was worth. The estimate from Charles Black — the “external staffer” who apparently and without fanfare resigned in March after making $100,000 “representing” the City as its Chief Negotiator with the Angels and brokering the now-disgraced CS&L Report on the value of Angels Baseball to Anaheim — had suggested a figure of perhaps as low as $30 million.
Now we have a decent estimate (warning, that links to a PDF): it is worth from $220 million to over $300 million. That’s a public asset — one that Anaheim’s General Fund will desperately need in the future.
The Coalition of Anaheim Taxpayers for Economic Responsibility, or CATER, was formed shortly after this plan was slammed through with minimal public notice after the 2013 Labor Day weekend. (I’m General Counsel for the group — a fact cited as critical and damning to many of those who voted to remove me from the leadership of the Democratic Party of Orange County this past Monday. I don’t feel particularly damned by it today!)
CATER is (and thus I am) involved in litigation on this issue right now, so I can’t comment on it the way that I would prefer. But I will say this: eight months ago today — just after Cynthia Ward called me and Brian Chuchua about the details of the agenda item, and while we were literally and desperately trying to round up anyone we could, homeless people include, to take part in a “citizens filibuster” of the next evening’s Anaheim City Countil meeting so that we could slow down the process enough to understand what was going on — this was a done deal. We had no expectation that we could stop it, or do more than just slow it down enough to examine carefully. The political insiders were laughing at the political insurgents, whose only ally at the time inside the city government was the city’s Mayor, Tom Tait.
Four weeks later, the four-person Anaheim City Council majority — led in this effort by the sole Democrat on the City Council, Jordan Brandman — tried to strip Mayor Tait of his power to put any item on the agenda without the permission of at least one person in the majority. That was, his now-Mayoral-opponent Lucille Kring admitted, primarily a response to his attempt to roll back the approval of the lease agreements approved on Sept. 3. Tait outfoxed the majority by, prior to the possibility of his power being stripped, scheduling the Angels negotiations as an agenda item for every third meeting until negotiations were completed. That act allowed the City Council to later consider and approve this appraisal.
I can’t adequately express how close Anaheim taxpayers came to not knowing the value of what they were giving away prior to doing so — and how relatively few of us stood in the way. And now it is clear that we were right to urge caution and transparency. It’s a great day both for Anaheim, for transparency, and for government accountability.
Okay, now that we have an objective appraisal, what next?
The Kleptos are going to come up with some other happy horse shit to “prove” that the Angels still should get the land for free (oops, sorry Cunningham, you’re right, $1 per year is the deal point so it isn’t “free”) because of how darn valuable the team is to the City, even though the owner wants to get rid of the name “Anaheim” from his team’s name.
Ever helpful, here’s what I propose for my city:
Tear up the rancid MOUs as never being concocted in good faith on anybody’s part, and start over.
Start negotiating from a position of equality, if not strength.
Forget the land development as part of any deal, unless Arte wants to pony up $300 mil to buy the land; if Arte want to submit a development proposal in response to an RFP, God bless him.
Kick the political crap out of the crooks who voted to give Moreno a FREE three year extension on his opt out clause, the biggest single violation of public trust I think I have ever seen in local government – and that’s saying a lot.
Audit the contract with Mr. Charles Black, right down to the ground. Heckuva job, Blackie!
And the good faith shown to the rank and file citizenry of Anaheim? Where is this being exhibited? Nope, we are expected to sit passively in “the audience” watch their references during meetings, they call us “the audience” not recognizing that members of the public present in Chambers are a critical component of representative government. NO, we are seen as “the audience” where we have been summoned to watch the performance art taking place without our input, as an audience does not dictate the script to the director or the author in a performance with an outcome as predetermined as the murder mystery dinner theater, but without the food.
By the way does anyone else think Chambers would benefit greatly from a snack stand and perhaps a small bar? Not a full bar, cocktails are a little outrageous for a government meeting, but maybe some local craft beers and some wine by the glass? These meeting get long and some of us come straight from work..I have honestly been tempted to order pizza delivered. Now I am getting off topic.
We are forced to watch, quietly, as silence is the only symbol of respect these “leaders” understand. Indeed, voicing our displeasure by using a system set up for the participation portion of participatory government results in comments being parsed to decide who may and may not speak, having been given leave to address their Majesties in the Throne Room. That the microphone does not belong to them, but to us, is missed by them. That they have no more authority in that meeting room to dictate what will and will not be said or by whom than the authority they hold on the sidewalk in front of City Hall, well that is missed too. (Hang on-Pepperoni and sausage, or veggie supreme? OK I am back.)
Those who manage to share a coherent message of dissent from the grand visionary plan being imposed upon us against our will and without our informed input are dismissed because the leadership somehow is under the impression that they are only obligated to represent the people who think just like they do, the rest of us are not entitled to a hearing or consideration. We are called “misinformed” by the very people who illegally withhold critical information from us. We are called “politically motivated” by those who forgot that many of us did support them politically until they turned their backs on the idea of public resources being used for a common benefit, or that our political support is tied to what we see done at the dais, not the other way around.
Good faith? You have got to be kidding me?!
Six figures for a negotiator who undervalued the public asset he was charged with representing by A QUARTER BILLION DOLLARS.
There’s a real question of competence there.
“There’s a real question of competence there.”
Or worse. Much, much worse.
“A quarter-billion dollars” is such an ugly way to put it, Ryan. Can’t we just say something like “by 90%”?
(Note: to be fair, I haven’t actually done the math yet. But I will!)
1000% or 900% actually, depending on what you want your word choice to be. 90% would be $57m.
Anywho, the dude was off by a zero. That’s really really sad.
In a world where CSL can get $30K for 11 pages of pictures and Jordan Brandman can get $25,000 for plagiarizing a worthless “analysis” nothing is improper or embarrassing. To be embarrassed presupposes a sense of shame in the first place.
I see Mr. Business of Baseball is now claiming Blackie was on the level since nobody really knew the real value – $30 to $350 mil. And that only goes to re-enforce the reality of wanton disregard of the public trust: to give away something of which you didn’t even know the value.
There really is something evil going on in Anaheim, and I don’t think I have ever used that word in a political context before.
Indeed. The only business in the world where an assessed value of +/- 90% is acceptable. Real business acumen right there, let me tell you.
Here’s a nice sentence from a recent article of Adam’s:
http://www.voiceofoc.org/oc_north/anaheim/article_8289666c-c9c2-11e3-8919-0019bb2963f4.html
So, betting that Adam is right instead of Dan, the $30M should be $20M, and the $350M didn’t come from the city at all.
Reminding people of what Black ACTUALLY SAID in that first hearing is going to be such a huge recurring pleasure that I’m afraid that I might forget to breathe.
It depends on whether you use the higher or lower number as the base for the comparison. I prefer the higher number so that the maximum drop is 100%. Supposedly.
Since I am forbidden to post there, I’ll “BLOG WHORE” (whatever that means, although whore and DAN C. go hand in hand) I’ll share this observation from the “LOC”:
“Nicer seats, cleaner an more modern bathrooms, better concession choices…I could go on. Yes, the Big A is a fine field. We deserve better.”
First, I KNOW a ton of people, professional and otherwise, including me who would clean the shitters day in and day out at the Big A for $250 Million! Seriously, cleaner bathrooms, stop me please Zenger/Cantnor, MORE Concession choices….WTF, are you there to watch the game or eat Arby’s???? I like Coors light, I usually walk a bit, but I get one.
Now, the creme’: “We Deserve Better”! -Cover your eyes kids- WHAT THE FUCK IS HE TALKING ABOUT? he deserves nothing. No customer of the Angels “Deserve” anything. The owners of the stadium do though. They deserve honest government.
This guy is a FAT, WHITE, SUBURBANITE SLOB (to steal a phrase from Dennis O’leary). Go ahead Dan, skip Fenway, Oakland, in favor of Camden Yards and Comerica (a detroit shithole). But BEWARE, in both those parks, your kids will see actual Black People selling popcorn and maybe even scalped tickets and tee-shirts outside, so keep the IPHONE ready to notify the PD!
This guy is the best target ever, what a moron.
Thumbs up. Way way up.
The “we deserve better” line has a creepy, richy-rich, coddled, entitled vibe to it.
FAT, WHITE, SUBURBANITE SLOB
Come to think of it, I wonder where this toad gets off talking about sports at all. I mean, really – the last guy chosen every time in grade school. The motor moron who couldn’t get near a playing field except as a spectator. The clown whose sports credentials come from coaching his embarrassed kid’s kiddie league teams.
Sad. Mr. Business of Baseball, a self defined authority because he pays for an outfield ticket and buys a tub of $10 beer.
That. And I think he lived in Boston for a time, probably walked the hallowed grounds of Fenway Park, and now fancies himself some sort of expert on the game.
B-b-b-but Fenway is over a hundred years old! The people of Boston deserve better.
Just goes to show how incredibly weak the “Angel Stadium is the 4th oldest baseball stadium” as a reason to build a new stadium argument really is.
Yes it is weak. Even weaker is the Big Lie promulgated by Mr. BoB that Moreno is going to use his development income to build a new one – even though that isn’t even mentioned in the dreadful MOUs, let alone required.
Nameless, the LOCO blog may reconsider your participation , and you may be even become one of their contributors :” For the record, we’re always looking for other points of view here at the LiberalOC. If you are interested in commenting as an author on this blog, please drop me an email at Chris@TheLiberalOC.com. Right now, it’s primarily Dan and I contributing, and even we (at least me) get a little bored being the only mouths yapping and fingers tapping on our keyboards.”
A good fitting for them would be Cunningham, Junior ,Ltpar , even Stanley. “Challenging the right-wing noise machine” means challenging Dan C and his shilling for the Pringle’s enterprises.
It’s sort of funny (in a grotesque) way how Mr. BoB only seems to have one friend in the OC blogsphere. And that buddy maims children’s toys and then sets up votive candles in order to make fun of dead people he doesn’t like.
I certainly applaud this milestone in “transparency”, with full appreciation for the path it took to reach it. Merely (for now) skimming the several hundred pages left me with several pages of notes and questions. However The Council Agenda for Tuesday’s meeting shows that Barrett Sports is (doubling their compensation for) stepping into Black’s shoes (left behind in his exit?), and the usual suspects on the dias are already reported elsewhere as cranking up the drumbeat of hysteria to close a deal, raising the questions if the inside pages of their presumed Appraisal hardcopies would show any of their fingerprints. The City has STILL left the Residents –
WITHOUT a schedule,
WITHOUT a negotiation stance of its own (leaving it totally up to a guess, WHAT
difference, IF ANY away from Arte Moreno’s Wish List (Author STILL UNknown!)
will constitute a “success”),
WITHOUT any correction to, or replacement of, the CS&L so-called “Economic Study”
(fabricated WITHOUT data from Anaheim),
WITHOUT any basis to assume our inputs to the bottomless e-mail and voicemail
boxes, get anywhere NEAR the mythical negotiation “table” that ‘everything’ is
supposedly on, and
WITHOUT a study, bid, or so much as a finding, to support the implied ordination of
the Angels as BEST developers of any project, ALREADY INCORPORATED without
correction, AS A TALKING POINT in the previous ‘PUBLIC INPUT’ shows.
Will the Black-to-Barrett transition yield a fresh effort to improve public confidence that Council is truly placing value over speed, giving serious consideration to alternatives raised through the appraisal analysis, and providing Staff with Direction incorporating Public input?
What communication is required, from the Public, and from Staff and Council, to obtain Public assurances against a mere change from ‘giving away’ a bad deal on a parcel of unknown value, to merely ‘giving away’ a bad deal on a parcel of KNOWN value?
Time for a Citizens MOU. I will bet we can create better deal points than the morons under contract. But then, we actually get the concept of “due diligence” and “fiduciary duty to taxpayers.”
Let’s get to work.
I can think of all sorts negotiable deal points. First, get rid of that 2036 opt out date. Second, give the City control of parking – with revenue sharing. Third, drop the attendance trigger. That provides no incentive for the Angels franchise to perform. Let him call the team any damn thing he wants to.
No development without full disclosure of and City approval of all Angels consultants, architects, and engineers.
Of course the term of the two agreements should be the same; come to think of it the agreements should be mutually binding – or better yet, there should be one entity – the Angels – that we are dealing with.
I’d favor David Zenger being put in charge of renegotiating the MOU, even though we sometimes have a “two scorpions in a bottle” aspect about us. He’s smart, he understands the issues, and he’d do a great job.
But would you do it for only $300/hour (or whatever it was that Charles Black was making), David?
I’d settle for some guy plucked at random off Anaheim Boulevard. We’d be bound to get a better deal.
Here’s another key issue: we need to know the cost of Moreno’s deferred maintenance issues as well as the cost of his suggested expenditures. These need to be understood more or less precisely. $150,000,000 has been thrown around a lot lately. Where did that come from and what does it really mean?
The contract absolutely has to have a specific schedule of maintenance and proposed upgrades with milestones memorialized in an addendum to the contract.
Thanks. I guess I’m going to have to go to that one.
I am astonished Chris Prevatt has hung around there this long. Dan seems to be hell bent on going down the Matt Cunningham road of self destruction.
There will come a day when Chris has to answer the simple question:
“If you knew this is how Dan was, why’d you hang around?”
I would to be able to comment there, but Chmiliewinski is so frightened of fair debate, it will never happen.
Irvine doesn’t seem too excited, and why should they be?
It’s funny how the Klepto’s running dogs think floating these non-starters is proof positive that the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim really can move. Actually, as each daffy overture gets shot down by city councils more honest than ours, it proves the point: Moreno really has few options, and none where he can get the kind gravy he can in Anaheim – even with a deal that’s on the up and up.
http://www.ocregister.com/articles/irvine-612437-city-team.html
We may be looking at the “Los Angeles Angels of Texas,” I suppose….
Los Angeles Angels of Ridgecrest?
Los Angeles Angels of Blythe?
Los Angeles Angels of Barstow?
Los Angeles Angels of Adelanto?
Los Angeles Angels of Simi Valley?
Los Angeles Angels of Oxnard?
Blackie was right! Anybody with thirty acres and a billion dollars lying around and Good Ol’ Arte’s on the move!
*Dave, can’t believe how right you are. Of course we think it should be the San Diego Angels of El Cajon or San Diego Angels of Escondido, but then if he really wanted to be elitest, Arte could he call them the La Jolla Friars and Angels of Mercy! The Anaheim land is worth upwards of $375 Milllion and we still get to keep the Ducks.
Los Angeles Angels of Twentynine Palms
Los Angeles Angels of Calipatria
Los Angeles Angels of China Lake
Los Angeles Angels of Pearblossom
Los Angeles Angels of Boron
Los Angeles Angels of Roubidoux
Los Angelss Angels of Pedley…
This has all the sounds of Richard Gere screaming “I’ve got nowhere else to go!” Well in that case, let’s be the bloody drill Sargent. I want the DOR.
1) You can call the team anything you want.
2) The City of Anaheim will build a parking garage that will be able to handle the needs of the stadium.
3) The City of Anaheim will run the garage charging for Parking what the City wants
4) The City of Anaheim will use the profits from garage operations to upgrade the stadium and to run a public sports complex
5) The City of Anaheim will create a sports complex of 1 football field, 2 soccer fields and 2-4 baseball diamonds on a portion of the property which will be managed by the Anaheim Department of Rec
6) The City of Anaheim will retain the right to develop the remaining property to the interest of the City of Anaheim and the residents
and that ends the property discussions.
*Sergeant……OK?
But you left out the most critical part: regardless of how reasonable your proposal is, how does Curt Pringle make money off of it? First things first, after all!
Long time coming … https://www.facebook.com/anaheimangelsdropla
OK who is running that facebook page? Cuz they get it!
We had a great one going … but I just didn’t think “Keep the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim” was a good title.
Excellent work mysterious writer!
As we look at this. there are a number of valuable items that Anaheim let Arte take off the table without a peep of objection.
The value of the remaining name. It is worth something. We hear that the suffix is a trifling detail at this point and that is true, but as long as it has value to Moreno (and even he admits it does) then it need to be negotiated for, just like a tangible object. Why did we not have that evaluated? yes you CAN put a monetary value on the name just as Disney has professionals put a monetary value on their corporate goodwill.
The value of the opt out clause. Buying out a lease means just that, you pay the landlord for the option of changing what you agreed to. We let Arte have it free and clear for the ludicrous excuse that he might be “unreasonable” if we backed him into a corner or that he is easier to deal with without the “sword of damocles” dangling over his head…yes a professional being paid $300 an hour as a sports attorney to negotiate ON OUR BEHALF said that during a public meeting and only ONE of the leaders elected to represent our best interests called bullshit on him.
Transportation and traffic mitigation. If the need for the $300 million streetcar is driven by traffic congestion, and few things cluster up the intersection of Katella and St College quite like an Angels game, then additional congestion producing development in one of the most congested intersections in the county would seem to leave Arte with the responsibility to financially participate in the cost of the streetcar as well as implementing some currently non-existing car pool or ride share measures. Otherwise public agencies subsidize the mitigation of his traffic impacts while he pockets pretty much all revenues per vehicle without incentive to reduce those vehicles.
Why is the ticket threshold set to leave Anaheim holding the bag if Arte Moreno fails to field a winning team that puts butts in the seats? I believe it is fair and reasonable to expect some rent or compensation for the otherwise free use of our public asset. Hell if I use Center Street Promenade for a street festival I have to pay a fee, despite generating revenues, and civic pride in a community event. Why not Arte? So flip the ticket threshold, and Anaheim pockets the first fruits of that harvest while Arte can be paid any residual amounts above that baseline as an incentive to get his team to WIN something and turn out the fans to push him up and over the line to participate in the ticket profits. Same with the parking lot, we own it, and we maintain the roads used to bring the cars into the lot, not to mention sacrificing the Measure M road repair funds to build the stupid train station if they take Angels Express so one way or another the public pays to deliver Morenos’ customers to Moreno’s ticket booths. Why do we not participate in the parking lot revenues generated by our investments?
That we would get to this place in the negotiations and JUST NOW be appraising ONE PORTION of the assets our leaders seem willing to offer Arte for the privilege of “keeping the Angels” not as a civic benefit but as a knee-jerk emotional reaction and cost-be-damned shows a disgraceful dereliction of fiduciary duty on the part of City Council and the staff that enables them. It’s called “due diligence” and I expect those negotiating on my behalf to perform their due diligence or expect to be removed from that position of trust. This is not “politically motivated” it is simple the “business” portion of the “business of baseball.”
Cynthia, maybe you can help me understand this. How is it that this increase has no impact on the general fund?
“The proposed First Amendment will provide the City the ability to further use Mr. Barrett’s expertise for services as approved by the Executive Director. The Amendment will increase the potential maximum compensation from $75,000 to $150,000 and extend the term of the agreement through June 30, 2015.
IMPACT ON BUDGET:
There is no impact on the General Fund, as costs associated with the items contained in this staff report are included in the Convention, Sports & Entertainment department’s annual operating budget. Any impacts as a result of completed negotiations would be communicated at that time:”
The rules of physics and math don’t apply at City Hall. That is why $158M in future revenues to one hotelier is a “benefit” to Anaheim, or raising ticket thresholds on Angels games lowering Anaheim’s cut of the deal is somehow dropped into a power point slide of advantages to the City, and of course July 2012 when the community reaction to the shooting of two young men while one leader applauded the resulting riots as a win with “no shots fired” because they were not forced to vote on something unpleasant. So spending more money on consultants after the fact when we should have hired them for appraisals and reviews BEFORE sitting at the bargaining table, well that is not going to affect anything. I suppose we can take it out of the budget for a community center for poor kids, and call it a youth program because otherwise these children would grow up in a city that had lost the Angels and that is just the worst thing ever in the history of municipal government and we can’t have that. Make sense? Yeah, me neither but I keep trying.
Perhaps it makes sense once you understand that Kris Murray is Anaheim … and that most of Anaheim is not Anaheim, in her view.
Along those lines, I enjoyed this on Facebook just now.
http://www.buzzfeed.com/adriancarrasquillo/anthony-bourdain-perfectly-captures-americas-hypocritical-re