Nov 30, 2006 8:47 pm US/Pacific
49ers May Have Planned Santa Clara Move Last Year
by Simon Perez
SAN FRANCISCO (CBS 5 / AP) ―
Documents show the San Francisco 49ers secretly talked at length with Santa Clara County officials about building a new football stadium more than a year before the team announced its intention to relocate there.
Correspondence between the 49ers and the South Bay officials stretch back to at least October 2005, and continued through this fall as the team simultaneously worked on a deal with the city of San Francisco on a new stadium at Candlestick Point.
The San Francisco city attorney's office, using California's Public Records Act, obtained nearly 100 pages of e-mails from Santa Clara officials following the team's Nov. 9 press conference announcing its intention to relocate.
The documents suggest there were confidential meetings, requests for a soil report on land near the proposed stadium site in the city of Santa Clara, and other discussions.
The 49ers said they were always up front that Santa Clara was a backup plan should any deal with San Francisco collapse. Team officials said the documents simply show the team explored all of its options.
That argument is bolstered by one of the e-mails.
In July this year, Santa Clara Assistant City Manager Ron Garratt wrote: San Francisco 49er executive Larry MacNeil "was very clear that the Niners were committed to building a stadium at Candlestick point … He went on to say that if it appeared a new stadium in SF was not feasible the Niners would be interested in looking at the Great America Theme Park as a possible stadium location."
But aides to San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom have accused the team of negotiating dishonestly with the city during stadium talks.
The abrupt announcement that the team would move scuttled the San Francisco's bid to host the 2016 summer Olympics.
(© 2006 CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. The Associated Press contributed to this report.)
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