SAN FRANCISCO (KRON) — Super Bowl 50 is coming up in three weeks, and big plans are in motion both in San Francisco and Santa Clara.
But one San Francisco supervisor believes the city got a bad deal and will be on the hook for millions of dollars with little return on the investment. San Francisco is on the hook for about $4.9 million to host the week-long festivities leading up to the Super Bowl.
Conversely, Santa Clara is not spending much to have the game there. That is because the Super Bowl Host Committee is covering many of Santa Clara’s costs.
San Francisco supervisor John Avalos said more should have been done to get the NFL to kick in funds.
And the supervisor said San Francisco is not getting enough out of the deal.
“We look at Santa Clara, (and) they were able to get $3.6 million in reimbursements for their city services that they’re providing for the Super Bowl. But in San Francisco, our $4.9 million that are estimated to be the cost to us are not getting reimbursed by the NFL,” Avalos said.
Avalos said the mayor did not seek the opinion of other lawmakers on the deal and said taxpayer dollars should not be spent to throw a party like the one planned at the Super Bowl City complex.
“I believe that there (were) either no negotiations and a pass given to the NFL on the costs, or there (were) bad negotiations,” Avalos said. “But we really should have had some effort to recover our costs and what the inconveniences is to taxpayers and to people who live in San Francisco, who will have to deal with the impacts of neighborhood services being shifted over to pay for the Super Bowl or for Muni being rerouted….”
The mayor’s office said that the city will make up for the cost though taxes, and business owners will have increased sales on that week.
The Super Bowl 50 Host Committee has issued a statement on Friday on the costs and revenues:
In a regional collaboration, San Francisco and Santa Clara joined forces with the Host Committee to bring Super Bowl 50 to the Bay Area.
Santa Clara will host the game.
Because Santa Clara’s stadium was built with public funds, local law prohibits general fund money from being used for certain gameday costs. Santa Clara is, however, using public funds to produce a number of promotional events surrounding Super Bowl 50, and will absorb some costs not associated with the stadium itself.
While Santa Clara doesn’t have the large number of hotel rooms or other amenities to generate hotel and sales taxes on the magnitude San Francisco does, Santa Clara will enjoy an economic boost through the increased number of public and private events that will generate local spending, and through gameday spending at Levi’s Stadium.
San Francisco is hosting the large, free public festivities that will draw tens of thousands of people to “Super Bowl City” every day for nine days. The Host Committee is paying for this public event – it is paying for building the temporary city, operating it, staffing it, paying the performers, tearing it down and cleaning up. The city will absorb the cost of expanded city services (principally, public transportation and public safety) as it would for any large public event, such as Chinese New Year, Pride or Fleet Week. The city will more than make its money back through the dramatic increase in hotel and sales taxes.
The city will also benefit from a number of other events. The NFL is renting out the Moscone Center for NFL Experience and for the Media Center, which will draw 5,000 journalists to San Francisco. There will also be a variety of ticketed events and a variety of private parties, all of which are being paid for by private organizers.
The overall economic impact of the Super Bowl is expected to be in the hundreds of millions.
Thus, both cities, as well as other cities around the region, stand to make millions of dollars – money that would not exist but for the Super Bowl – on these weeklong activities. More than $13 million is being raised for youth-serving charities as well.
Hundreds of local business, thousands of local workers, and tens of thousands of Bay Area youth will be the direct beneficiaries of Super Bowl 50.
Mayor Ed Lee also released a statement Friday to KRON:
The San Francisco Bay Area bid to host the Super Bowl because of the enormous financial benefits it will bring, like benefits to our workforce, to families, to charities, and a huge economic boost to our number one industry, tourism. We fully expect a financial win for San Francisco and the mayor is proud of the work the city did to win the bid to host this historic event and thanks the Super Bowl Host Committee for raising the funds necessary to put on the free, family friendly events here like concerts with Alicia Keys and Chris Isaacs that will make it a spectacular week in San Francisco.