Public Hearings Allow Raiders Fans to Voice Opinions

Fans felt the Chargers - and especially the team's special counsel, Mark Fabiani - hadn't given the city enough time to properly put together a new stadium plan. Sherman acknowledged that government leadership has come and gone, but the one constant is Fabiani's employment with the Chargers and his negativism toward the latest round of negotiations between the team and the city of San Diego. Fans accused him of convincing Chargers owner Dean Spanos to walk away from the negotiating table with the city with a potential deal within reach.

The long-running stadium issue has become so contentious that Fabiani was booed and heckled at an National Football League public hearing on Wednesday night.

And there were also jabs aimed at the NFL Executives.

If the Chargers were to leave next year, they'd be on the hook for $15 million in payments still owing on the bonds that bankrolled the 1996-97 renovation and expansion of Qualcomm Stadium. They're trying to prove out their case; their case being that you can build a stadium at Mission Valley, you can get it financed, it can be attractive and any environmental challenges can be dealt with. "If the Chiefs can keep manufacturing offense without Jamaal Charles, and Peyton Manning can figure out how to look like Peyton Manning again for more than two or three plays per game, the Chargers could sink to the bottom of the standings". "I'm here to tell you that's the furthest thing from the truth".

Faulconer has responded to Fabiani's moves by taking his case straight to NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell and members of the Committee on Los Angeles Opportunities. "It's not complicated", Grubman said. "The failure to come up with a solution in San Diego has nothing to do with the Chargers fans". "They're working on that, and that is forward progress as compared to a year ago".

An estimated 350 people attended the NFL-sponsored event at the Spreckles Theater in downtown San Diego. If whatever they're saying comes true, and they're sharing a stadium with the Raiders, they're going to have a stadium full of Raider fans. "I recognize they want to be part of it, and they want to be part of a victory".

Tickets to the three hearings were distributed on a first-come, first-served basis through an online registration process. "So it is incredibly unfair that the Chargers' great fans are now bearing the brunt of the decisions made by politicians over the last 14 years".

The mayor's office also said they stressed at the meeting that the Mission Valley site was the only option that could go before voters next year and be built before the end of this decade, and that a downtown site would be acceptable if the Chargers were willing to stay in town and wait the five to seven years it would take to improve the site.