Milestones

By Miles H Barber

We should be in the Super Bowl.

The 49ers played their hearts out and showed their level of desire to win. However, it is a team game and like a chain, every link has got to be strong to make the team strong.

Jed York may not have liked Sunday’s outcome, along with about 20 million fans, and he has taken leadership of the 49ers seriously. (There were actually 55 million folks watching this game).

When he became CEO, he promised the 49ers would return to a winning team and he would build a new dynasty in football.

While we were only moments away from a Super Bowl visit, York will not lament long in his desire to lead this team to New Orleans in 2013.

On Monday morning he wrote a short note to 49er season ticket holders indicating he has two goals for the organization. 1) Win Super Bowls and 2) build the world’s premier outdoor sports and entertainment venue.

Now, while York has plenty of competition from his opposition on the field, he is facing a new challenge from opponents off the field.

The dissident faction of “Santa Clara Plays Fair” found enough uninformed people to sign a petition to have Santa Clara revote on whether we build the new stadium.
City Clerk Rod Diridon announced last week that he had certified the 5,000 signatures that were turned in by the naysayers.

So, our City Council can accept this petition as a legitimate issue to once again go back to the voters to make sure we really want a stadium or, they can reject this petition on a number of different counts.

Let’s take a look for just a moment at what the issue is. The opponents say that voters were told the 49er loan would be $450 million. They say they were never told the 49ers would take out a loan of $850 million.

So?

If Goldman Sachs is willing to lend the 49ers $850 million or even $85 billion, what does that have to do with the voters of Santa Clara? Our general fund is not at risk. Our citizens are not at risk any more than when Intel or Yahoo borrows a few hundred million.

If the City Council accepts this petition, it means we would need to do a special election and print a copy of all 550 pages of the agreement between the 49ers and the City of Santa Clara, mail it to every registered voter and await the outcome.

Now from a group that indicates they have only the concerns for our city as their premise this is a most contradictory action. To hold this special election is estimated to cost Santa Clara up to $2 Million dollars. This money would come from our general fund and we as taxpayers would foot the bill.

This is one idea whose time is past. Let’s move on to next season.