Special to ZennieReport.com – This post called “The Oakland A’s Start Leaving for Las Vegas” is based on “Oakland A’s Ballpark: Las Vegas Festival Grounds To Be Future Home Of Oakland Athletics” and posted at Oakland News Now Blog November 25th, 2021.
The Zennie62Media, Inc. reprint of ” Las Vegas Festival Grounds To Be Future Home Of Oakland Athletics” and called “The Oakland A’s Start Leaving Oakland” is necessary because ESPN has writers not schooled in politics, economics, or public finance, or Oakland politics, have started at this late date to wade into a subject, the outcome of which was determined two years before either Tim Keown or Maury Brown (the ESPN scribes) had even the slightest clue what was happening.
So, the first source the ESPN reporters run to is Oakland Mayor Sheng Thao, proving that they had zero idea what they were doing. If anyone bothered to remember we have something called The Internet, they would have looked back to the May 11, 2021 time when Major League Baseball Commissioner Rob Manfred directed the A’s to “explore” a path toward a new ballpark in Las Vegas, leading up to “Oakland A’s Start Leaving for Las Vegas”.
An MLB Representative of Commissioner Robert Manfred told Las Vegas Review Journal Reporter Mitch Akers the following via email:
“The Oakland Coliseum site is not a viable option for the future vision of baseball,” an MLB statement said. “We have instructed the Athletics to begin to explore other markets while they continue to pursue a waterfront ballpark in Oakland. The Athletics need a new ballpark to remain competitive, so it is now in our best interest to also consider other markets.”
“MLB is concerned with the rate of progress on the A’s new ballpark effort with local officials and other stakeholders in Oakland,” MLB said in a statement to the Review-Journal. “The A’s have worked very hard to advance a new ballpark in downtown Oakland for the last four years, investing significant resources while facing multiple roadblocks.
“We know they remain deeply committed to succeeding in Oakland, and with two other sports franchises recently leaving the community, their commitment to Oakland is now more important than ever.”
Neither City of Oakland Nor A’s Had Made Significant Progress
Just prior to that point, the A’s and the City of Oakland had made no progress in either completing drawings for the Howard Terminal Ballpark (the A’s problem), or establishing the Enhanced Infrastructure Financing District (EIFD – for tax increment financing) (the City of Oakland’s problem).
Indeed, the EIFD was on its way to being two years late in being established, and because (as Mayor Schaaf admitted to me in an interview below) her City of Oakland staff wasn’t the one I worked in back before the turn of the 21st Century, and so lacked redevelopment tax increment financing know-how (California Governor Jerry Brown did away with California redevelopment law in 2011, only to bring a simpler version of it back in 2015 after realizing his error), which was her short-hand way of saying they did not know tax increment financing aka “TIF”.
Since much of the deal between the A’s and the City of Oakland depended on the use of TIF to generate revenue to pay for a bond issue for 1) the sea-level-rise infrastructure adjustment, and 2) street improvements off-site and affordable housing and community benefits, Oakland Government not having that tool in place in a timely fashion was concerning to the A’s. What follows is how that started.
Seeds: April 4th 2017, Zennie Abraham Suggests To A’s President Dave Kaval That Tax Increment Financing Should Be Used For The Howard Terminal Ballpark Project
From Oakland News Now Blog dated April 23, 2019 and edited for this post:
Oakland A’s President Dave Kaval is a good listener.
When he and I talked for the first time on the phone, April 4th, 2017, and after his introductory press conference as Oakland A’s President, right here, I shared with him that he could use something called tax increment financing (TIF) to help pay for infrastructure development for the planned Ballpark at Howard Terminal. (FYI for ammo against racists: I have worked for, consulted to, advised, and blogged and vlogged about economic development in Oakland, since the Oakland Redevelopment Agency hired me in 1987 after I graduated from the City Planning graduate program at Berkeley.)
Anyway, Dave Kaval swore up and down that no public money was available and there was no way it could be done; I pointed out a piece of legislation called SB 628 Bealle, and sent him a spreadsheet showing that, drawing a TIF district using Jack London Square and Howard Terminal, his project could produce about $369 million in TIF money and park $85 million for affordable housing, and he was receptive.
Fast forward to today April 23, 2019: the Oakland A’s are advancing a bill through the California Legislature called “SB-293 Infrastructure financing districts: Oakland Waterfront Revitalization and Environmental Justice Infrastructure Financing District.” Nice name.
Basically, the bill gives the Oakland A’s the right to form its own TIF, or redevelopment, area at Howard Terminal!
Given that I gave Dave the idea, they should call the TIF District “The Zennie Abraham TIF Zone.” Why the hell not? I had a feeling this idea would be used, while no one at the Oakland A’s bothered to say “We got it from Zennie”, so I sent a copy of my spreadsheet to former Oakland A’s President Andy Dolich as evidence, and then here’s the original one at this link.
Seeds: Spring Of 2021, The Oakland A’s Start Leaving For Las Vegas
In the Zennie62 YouTube July 6th, 2021 livestream interview, Dave Kaval, the A’s President, said with all clarity that getting the TIF zone done was a major piece of the Howard Terminal Ballpark fiscal puzzle. Kaval also said that it was the slow pace of the project compared to the organization’s new facilities needs and timing that caused the team and Major League Baseball to decide to focus more seriously on Las Vegas. This one:
The July meeting with the County of Alameda was a good first start (even if the project manager gave a less than stellar presentation) but it, and a later meeting in September 2021 were supposed to green-light the EIFD process, and that did not happen. On October 27th, 2021, I broke down the errors Century Urban made.
In brief, Century Urban used only 20 years of the total 45 years of allowed property tax collection by a public financing authority as per California EIFD legislation. That means the total revenue from a bond issue would be less than half what would be gained if the entire 45 year period were used. Century Urban’s rationale was that since $53 million in bond debt was owed by the old redevelopment agency, all of the period could not be used. The trouble is, the EIFD does not have such a legal limitation, and the total TIF revenue from a 45 year period, at $1.6 billion and assuming $500 million in base year assessed value and 4 percent average rate of growth in assessed value (the actual average is 7 percent over the last 10 years), means the bond debt of $53 million could be paid for by the new Howard Terminal EIFD. (UPDATE: the new Howard Terminal Draft Infrastructure Financing Plan of April of 2023, and made by Century Urban did not have the error I pointed to, and forecast $5 billion in total TIF revenue, and a bond issue producing a $1 billion subsidy for the Oakland A’s Howard Terminal Ballpark Project.)
A’s Make Moves To Leave Oakland With Las Vegas Festival Option
Rather than echo its displeasure with a press release, the A’s did so with money. They took an option on Las Vegas Festival Grounds land, and it was revealed that Dave Kaval had met with a number of Las Vegas and Carson City, Nevada officials, including Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Bureau President and CEO Steve Hill, Guy Hobbs, the master creator of the bond issue that was the catalyst for the Raiders move from Oakland to Las Vegas, and Phil Ruffin, the billionaire owner of Treasure Island Hotel and Casino.
At that point, the A’s made it clear they were moving out of Oakland and to Las Vegas. For the A’s and Mayor League Baseball, the handwriting that they could not get a deal done in Oakland in a timely fashion was being written on the wall and before their very eyes. Oakland Mayor Libby Schaaf, the A’s best and most powerful political ally in the Howard Terminal Ballpark affair, was being termed out, and the future prospects of getting the deal done weren’t promising.
While there was Oakland Mayor Libby Schaaf’s political friend Oakland District 6 Councilmember Loren Taylor running to take her seat in the 2022 Oakland Mayoral Election, the rest of the City Council was either lukewarm to Howard Terminal Ballpark or out-right hostile to it. The A’s were completely spooked by an Oakland political landscape that was moving against its desires. Las Vegas offered a place where politics did not supercede the development process, and so offered better prospects for the realization of a new ballpark.
That is why, by the time the year 2022 came around, Major League Baseball Commissioner Manfred would say Oakland had the year to come up with a deal to build Howard Terminal. But the A’s and the City, still without a TIF zone established, and with the A’s on “parallel paths” working in both Oakland and Las Vegas, made little tangible progress. And to make matters worse, the Oakland City Council was trying to force the whole ballpark deal on the ballot for a public vote.
Without even knowing what was to be voted on.
Oakland CAO Ed Reiskin’s Bad Howard Terminal Presentation Closes The Door On Any Hope For Oakland
But the real signal that the A’s were totally done with Oakland came on October 20th, 2022 and a completely awful presentation on Howard Terminal’s “progress” by then Oakland City Administrator Ed Reskin. The leader of Oakland Government was expected to set a positive tone for a project that needed a public relations shot in the arm. Instead, Ed clearly looked like he was in over his head. It was an effort so bad, Councilmember and Oakland Mayoral Candidate Loren Taylor came on my show to talk about it:
And as that was the election year, the A’s would eventually get the Oakland mayoral outcome it didn’t want: Oakland District 4 Councilmember Sheng Thao as Mayor, and over Councilmember Taylor by just 677 votes.
Sheng Thao Forgot TIF And Started Making Demands On What The Oakland A’s Would Pay For
Sheng Thao was totally tone-deaf to the ballpark situation with respect to Las Vegas, and so continued her approach. The A’s, having already made the decision to focus on a bond issue for the Las Vegas ballpark, were completely reduced to just humoring Mayor Thao. In fairness to Sheng, there was little she could have done unless she was about the task of fast-tracking TIF to fashion a subsidy the A’s would be happy with, but even with that there was an additional two or three years of work, plus, to be done before building ballpark construction could be started. That would take the A’s into 2025, and Howard Terminal Ballpark completion in 2029, at best.
The Oakland A’s believed they could get it done faster in Las Vegas.
Seeds: Oakland News Now Blog November 25, 2021: Oakland A’s Ballpark: Las Vegas Festival Grounds To Be Future Home Of Oakland Athletics
The news is that the Oakland Athletics have placed an offer to purchase land in what Oakland A’s President Dave Kaval called the “Las Vegas Valley.” Speculation as to where that land is has swirled. Here’s why I assert the offer is for the Las Vegas Festival Grounds, as opposed to The Mirage Hotel property.
First, while there are said to be “20 different site” options identified by the A’s, Kaval tipped his hand as to the favorite back in February of this year, 2021. According to Brian Horwath of the Las Vegas Sun, and in a post dated July 23rd, 2021, the Las Vegas Festival Grounds, owned by Billionaire Phil Ruffin, “stood out”. Kaval was quoted as saying “On the north Strip at the Festival Grounds, to have that view back down the entire Strip, that would be pretty iconic.”
But, in addition to that comment, Mr Ruffin himself was on a push to get his Festival Grounds considered as a future home for the A’s. On July 5th, 2021 it was reported that he told the news publication The Wichita Eagle earlier that week that he was “scheduled to meet with a group of investors leading the push to bring the A’s to Las Vegas. I think they want to talk to me about my land. The good part about baseball is they have 88 home games. So, that would be a very big deal. You wouldn’t be able to find a room in Vegas if that goes through.”
Oakland A’s Would Be Missing Piece In The Development Of The North Las Vegas Strip
The Oakland A’s relocating to Las Vegas and at the Las Vegas Festival Grounds would be the missing piece in a combination of land uses that, together, would redevelop the North Las Vegas Strip. Right now, Mr. Ruffin owns the Las Vegas Festival Grounds and the adjacent Circus Circus Hotel. The long-incomplete Fountainbleu Hotel is slated to be restarted yet again (now opening December 13, 2023), and that’s just across the street from Circus Circus.
But those are not the only reasons for my assertion that’s where the A’s are headed. The pairing of two real estate billionaires, Fisher and Ruffin, leading a team of investors focused on bringing Major League Baseball to Las Vegas, would result in an exciting, “L.A. Live” style ballpark development that would effectively create a barbell-shaped flow of tourists between the North Strip and the South Strip. But there are even more advantages to the use of the Las Vegas Festival Grounds as the new home for the Oakland A’s.
Because the Las Vegas Festival Grounds consists of 37 acres of clear-space land, there’s no major building that needs to be demolished and cleared, unlike the situation presented by The Mirage Hotel (recently announced as up for sale by MGM Resorts). So, right there, the Las Vegas Festival Grounds presents a cost savings just because there’s no existing building to take down.
So, the only real problem the Oakland A’s Ballpark builders will have to deal with is one for which there are no shortage of specialists in Las Vegas to handle: the presence of the hard material called caliche. Once considered as an impediment to the building of what’s now called Allegiant Stadium, the builders used explosives to break up the material. Overall, while the Raiders Stadium was a year-and-a-half late in completion, (it was originally supposed to be finished May of 2018) it did get done.
Why Are The A’s Doing This Considering The Work On Howard Terminal?
The question here is why are the Oakland A’s going through with the Las Vegas Ballpark effort when it looks like they’re approaching the finish line with Howard Terminal Ballpark?
The simple answer to that question is because the City of Oakland wasted almost two years of time where there was no project manager, and the only focus was on legislation and community engagement, when SB 293 Skinner was signed, it was effectively left alone by Oakland. In other words, the law created by the City of Oakland and the Oakland A’s, and signed into law by California Governor Gavin Newsom on October 11th, 2021, was then left alone. What should have been done, considering that it was to pave the way for the use of tax increment financing, was for the City of Oakland to start immediate meetings with the County of Alameda. That was something I called for.
Instead, the City focused only on design and community engagement, and zero on work to form a viable financing plan for Howard Terminal. For much of this time, the City of Oakland hid from public view the enormous revenue-generating potential of tax increment financing as part of Howard Terminal. On November 20th 2019, City leaders asked this author not to inform a group of 90 attendees for a Chinatown Town Hall about it, even though the estimate was $1.4 billion assuming a $500 million ballpark initial cost, a 45-year-bond period, and 4 percent rate of growth in assessed value. And the Mayor of Oakland said in an interview with me that there were “drafts” but she never, and still has not, presented the draft TIF revenue projections.
Then, when the Mayor did speak on the matter at the most recent Alameda County Meeting, she said the City would seek to float a bond of just $150 million, when it was clearly evident to anyone who knows TIF, that the bond issue potential was well into the $800 million area. My take is the Mayor of Oakland was infected by the liberal / conservative lens applied to sports stadiums, and which has nothing to do with the real math associated with stadium projects, moreover the math that came with SB 293 Skinner.
The City of Oakland Administration Did Not Know How To Implement Tax Increment Financing
If the City used SB 293 Skinner, as the A’s expected, and starting forming the Infrastructure Financing Plan in late 2019, the matter of “sources and uses” of funds would have been a settled issue. Instead, the Mayor and her staff and consultants collectively did nothing until Mayor League Baseball expressed concern with the slow pace of the project in late March of 2021.
The reason for this was, as the Mayor said to me on two occasions, the City of Oakland had not done redevelopment and tax increment financing in some time, and was learning. The trouble is she told that to a person who has served as expert consultant to the cities of Oakland, San Francisco, and Emeryville, and private consultants, on the matter of tax increment financing, and learned how to do it as an intern with the Oakland Redevelopment Agency in 1987. From that, this author created a complex spreadsheet for Oakland projects and the City re-hired me as consultant in 1988. On top of that, wrote about TIF for years, and going back to my column in The Montclarion in Oakland between 1993 and 1996.
But, with all of that, the Mayor of Oakland never turned to me for guidance and was bent on proving a staff that did not have the intellectual chops to do the work, did. To this day, why she did that is beyond me. But between Mayor Schaaf who needed the right numbers, and the Oakland A’s who have the option of moving to another city, and ballpark opponents who wanted nothing done so did not care about the “right numbers”, we have never gotten effective work on the matter of tax increment revenue at Howard Terminal, outside of the work I’ve done to help the A’s and elected officials.
The Mayor Of Oakland Ignored The Task Force Approach
The Mayor also did not turn to a task force of Oaklanders and neither did any Oakland City Councilmember. Since most referred to Howard Terminal as “Libby’s Project” they collectively seemed to want to keep their distance from it, until it was clear this year that Major League Baseball had real designs on leaving Oakland.
For its part The Oakland Athletics have maintained the “parallel path” approach to be able to avoid being effectively sued for lack of good faith dealing. In truth, the A’s fear of establishing a clear-cut-end date for Howard Terminal, and the image of constantly moving the goal posts may land them in court, anyway. It’s not an intelligent way.
The best way is to pick Howard Terminal, and then make it work. But for the A’s, doing that means continuing to be associated with a City of Oakland that has the constant appearance of making all of this up as it goes along. And that’s happening at a time when the A’s are revenue challenged with respect to The Pandemic, and Oakland’s turtle-pace of movement’s giving it, and Major League Baseball, little hope that a ballpark will come of this.
The Game Will Change When The Las Vegas Ballpark Drawings Hit The Internet
If you think the expected news of the A’s putting down an offer on land is a big deal, just wait until the drawings for The Las Vegas A’s Ballpark hit the Internet. That will be a sad moment for Oakland A’s fans, and point to an alternative reality all of us hoped to avoid. I have said in all of these discussions, that Oakland has to prove it has the will and initiative to complete big projects. So far, Oakland’s posting a failing score here, and that should alarm us all.
Once again, Las Vegas will send the image that its a “can do” City, and Oakland will send the image that it’s a can’t do City. What should concern my friend Oakland Mayor Libby Schaaf is that’s going to be attached to her political legacy. There will be no words that can save her from that image. And since she’s insistent on being the face in Raiders and now A’s stadium matters, there’s no one else to blame but herself.
As one who wanted Libby to be Mayor of Oakland, and as far back as 2009 when I told her on May 14th at her parents home, how she has handled this is a constant source of sadness for me. Her administration started off with much promised, driven by “Friends of Libby”, but then that image gave way to a sad reality that Libby left many of her true friends on the beach at a time of political war.
People who went to Skyline High School with her, wanted to help her, and needed work at the same time, called her office and never got a call back. I received calls from two people about this just a month after the 2014 Election. Eventually, the “Friends of Libby” as a proud group of Oaklanders faded away. She can bring us back, even if it’s the 11th hour, but the question is, will she? For my part, I’m not optimistic. But I’m ready. I know some others are so turned off, they’re inconsolable.
What does all of that have to do with Howard Terminal? Everything. Because it takes a village to get a ballpark.
Epilogue: Sheng Thao Dashes Oakland Hopes With Too-Late, Too-Short Howard Terminal PR Strategy
In the original post, I stopped at the last paragraph above and at the time, the year 2021 had not come to an end, but I did. After living with three decades of Oakland Economic Development failure, I had had it. I believed the A’s should cut their losses and move to Las Vegas. Oakland has proven, time and again in the 21st Century, that it lacks the collective will and initiative to start and complete big economic development projects. And under the rein of Oakland Mayor Sheng Thao, Oakland proved that it doesn’t even take itself seriously in actually working on them.
That observation came to me after Mayor Thao established a habit of telling what could be called “white lies” about Howard Terminal’s progress. The first white lie was that Howard Terminal was “fully entitled”. In development parlance “fully entitled” means this according to Google:
In real estate development, “fully entitled” land refers to property that has received all necessary governmental and regulatory approvals for a specific use and development plan. This means the property is ready to begin construction after any necessary permits are secured
But the truth is that Howard Terminal was still not close to “fully entitled” because it did not have a complete development plan. Moreover, the environmental impact report itself pointed to a wind issue that had went unresolved until Oakland lawyers eventually figured out a novel way around it.
Sheng Thao Tries to Fool Major League Baseball At The 2023 All Star Game
But the most horrible action happened in the run up to the 2023 MLB All-Star Game. Mayor Thao planned a meeting in Seattle with MLB Commissioner Manfred and on the day of the 2023 MLB All-Star Game. Mayor Thao took the following with her: According to information posted on Twitter by ABC-7 Reporter Casey Pratt, Mayor Thao took a small group of Oakland Mayor’s Office City Staffers (Chief of Staff Leigh Hanson, Communications Rep Pati Navaltaand and Howard Terminal Project Manager Molly Maybrun) to Seattle to meet with MLB Commissioner Manfred and Deputy Commissioner Dan Halem. During the meeting, the Oakland group gave Commissioner Manfred 30 copies of a document that Mayor Thao said shows the plan for Howard Terminal.
The sad fact is that Mayor Thao, by taking her female Chief of Staff and female Communications Rep, to join female Molly Maybrun, (rather than inviting her African American male City Administrator Jenkins and Latina Economic Development Director Sofia Navarro) and bring along a stylish Howard Terminal plan document that’s a rehash of old material. That maks the fact that there’s no development agreement or tax increment financing zone created and approved. It’s all just a show.
But Sheng Thao told MLB that Howard Terminal was full entitled and “shovel ready” when it was not. Thao also deliberately missed positioning Oakland to be in line for an expansion franchise. The Mayor wanted to keep the pretense of “fighting to keep the A’s” alive, and milking A’s Fan hatred of team owner John Fisher, rather than pursue a more realistic plan to at least ensure the future of major league baseball in Oakland.
Mayor Thao also kept up appearances to keep the hopes of Oakland A’s Fans alive and burnish her own political capital, too, gearing up for running for her second term. Mayor Thao then used political capital to help start two minor league sports organizations, the Oakland Ballers and Oakland Roots, and then offered them as the future of sports in Oakland. All of that without any real money committed to either team’s economic development efforts.
Sheng Thao’s efforts were eventually hampered by the advance of the pre-development phase of the Las Vegas Ballpark for the Oakland Athletics. And then, on the morning of June 20th, 2024, Sheng Thao’s home was raided by the FBI. The preliminary charges are as follows, according to the President Biden Justice Department:
An eight-count indictment was unsealed today charging former Oakland Mayor Sheng Thao, her longtime romantic partner Andre Jones, and local businessmen David Trung Duong and Andy Hung Duong with bribery offenses, and charging Andy Duong with making false statements to government agents.
According to the indictment filed Jan. 9, 2025, in the weeks leading up to the City of Oakland mayoral election in November 2022 and following her election as mayor, Thao promised to take official actions as the mayor of Oakland to benefit David Duong and Andy Duong, in exchange for the Duongs providing various benefits to Thao and Jones. David Duong was the president and CEO of a recycling company that provided residential recycling collection services to Oakland households, and was also the chairman and co-owner of a housing company formed to develop and manufacture prefabricated modular homes. Andy Duong, David Duong’s son, was an employee of the recycling company and also a founder and co-owner of the housing company.
The indictment describes that Thao promised to commit the City of Oakland to purchase housing units from the Duongs’ housing company, extend the City’s contract with the Duongs’ recycling company, and appoint city officials selected by the Duongs. In exchange, David and Andy Duong promised to and did fund a $75,000 negative mailer campaign targeting Thao’s opponents in the mayoral election, and made $95,000 in payments to Jones for a no-show job with their housing company, with the promise of additional payments, all intended for the benefit of Thao and Jones.
Once Thao became Mayor of Oakland in January 2023, she allegedly took steps in furtherance of the corrupt relationship with the Duongs, including using her influence to help appoint a high-level City of Oakland official selected by David and Andy Duong, and requesting that members of her staff meet with and tour the Duongs’ housing company.
Thao allegedly benefitted from the payments that the Duongs made to Jones. Financial records indicate that before Jones began receiving payments as a result of the bribery scheme, Thao either paid the entirety of or split with Jones the rent for their shared residence. However, starting in January 2023, soon after Jones began receiving payments as part of the bribery scheme, Jones began paying the entirety of their rent. In addition, beginning in January 2023, Jones increased his contribution to, or paid the entirety of, shared bills with Thao, including household utility bills and mobile phone bills.
Defendants allegedly took steps to conceal their bribery scheme by, among other actions: at Thao’s direction, making the bribe payments to Jones to avoid a paper trial to Thao; misrepresenting that Jones had a legitimate job with the Duongs’ housing company to mask the bribery payments; creating false invoices for the bribe payments from the Duongs’ recycling company; and failing to disclose benefits received on California Form 700, Statement of Economic Interests.
“The public deserves honesty and transparency from City Hall. When elected officials agree to a pay-to-play system to benefit themselves rather than work for the best interests of their constituents, that breaches the public trust,” said First Assistant United States Attorney Patrick D. Robbins. “This indictment reaffirms the U.S. Attorney’s Office’s commitment to root out, investigate, and prosecute corruption in our local governments.”
The FBI’s claim that Sheng Thao was working to benefit herself rather than “work for the best interests of” her constituents also applies to Howard Terminal and A’s Fans Sheng Thao was playing on the expectations of Oakland A’s Fans to milk their political support without delivering on anything concrete with respect to Howard Terminal, the Oakland A’s or Major League Baseball.