Members of the East Oakland Stadium Alliance released the following statements in response to the Oakland City Council’s 6-1 vote to approve an amended agreement with the Oakland A's on their waterfront stadium and luxury housing-retail complex.
Sheryl Walton, Grassroots Organizer with the East Oakland Stadium Alliance:
We applaud the City Council for pushing back against threats and pressure from the Oakland A’s by approving a term sheet that recognizes the needs of the Oakland community. While the current non-binding agreement is a better deal for taxpayers and residents than the A’s draft, it still does not adequately protect the city, its residents, and its workers. The term sheet has insufficient protections for the Port of Oakland, leaves large funding gaps, requires the A’s to provide only the bare minimum in affordable housing as mandated by law, and offers zero money from the A’s towards community benefits. It also provides far greater public subsidies to a billionaire developer than other comparable projects in California.
Most critically, this waterfront stadium and luxury housing-retail project is still incompatible with the needs of our working port. Several members of the Council are in agreement that the existing Coliseum site remains a viable location for the A’s to build a new ballpark village, as it has ample transportation options, is already zoned for development, and would lift up the East Oakland community. We will continue to encourage a ‘no’ vote on any future agreement that refuses to take the needs of the entire Oakland community into account.
Mike Jacob, Vice President and General Counsel of the Pacific Merchant Shipping Association:
While we are opposed to the Howard Terminal project, and support the A’s building a new ballpark at the Coliseum, we are pleased that the City Council refused to take the A’s proposed term sheet lying down and instead pushed back on community benefits and seaport compatibility. While the A’s have been ignoring the issues of the working waterfront in a vain attempt at avoiding the costs of mitigating their project’s impacts on the community, today every single member of the City Council affirmed that the mitigation of impacts on the seaport is one of the keys to a successful framework for future negotiations. We agree that redevelopment of the Coliseum location with a new stadium would be a win-win for Oakland that would avoid the disruption of Port operations on the waterfront.
