UPDATE: In 2019, after delays, the Oakland Raiders restart Coliseum JPA Lease Extension negotiations.
The Oakland Raiders Coliseum Lease Extension to 2020 is almost finished.
The Oakland Raiders are one big step to playing more NFL football games at the Oakland Coliseum beyond this 2018 NFL Season. This morning, a special meeting of the Oakland-Alameda County Coliseum was held, and specifically to go over the months-in-the-making extension to the current lease at the sports stadium.
Right now, the Oakland Raiders are paying $3.5 million to the Coliseum JPA, and that’s an increase over the $925,000 paid by the Silver and Black in 2016. According to many conversations this blogger had with a number of people both on and associated with the Oakland Coliseum JPA, the initial versions of the lease extension were described to me as “draconian.”
Those expensive lease plans were borne of a desire by some Coliseum JPA Board Members to “punish” the Raiders for not just the Las Vegas Relocation itself, but for the many documented examples of the NFL team working behind the collective back of the City of Oakland and the County of Alameda. In one case, it was said that if the Raiders stayed to 2020, the rent would be $10 million. Another account had the rent schedule roughly doubling each year, from $3.5 millon in 2018 to $11 million by 2020.
Then, over the last month, Coliseum JPA Board members pointed to former Oakland City Councilmember Ignacio De La Fuente as wanting to give the Raiders a more reasonable deal. From the contact I had today, it looks like De La Fuente’s approach may have prevailed.
The next step is for the Coliseum JPA Executive Director Scott McKibben to send the lease proposal to Oakland Raiders President Mark Badain. Provided Mr. Badain and Raiders Owner Mark Davis agree with the new lease, it will be signed at the July meeting of the Coliseum Joint Powers Authority.
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