By Robert Haugh
Last week, the 49ers spent big in a mayoral campaign in another city other than Santa Clara.
The team dropped $400,000 for County Supervisor Cindy Chavez. They spent $300,000 to help her in the primary. She’s facing San Jose City Councilman Matt Mahan in the runoff.
This weekend, the Mahan campaign sent out a text message linking to a page on the Mahan campaign website.
The text message told San Jose voters what we already know in Santa Clara:
“The 49ers have already spent nearly $4,200,000 in the past two election cycles working to elect a developer-friendly council in Santa Clara, where they have faced a city council working to hold them accountable.
In 2020, they also contributed $300,000 to defeat a ballot initiative that attempted to change how the city’s council members are elected.
This year alone, Mercury News reports that their spending in Santa Clara City Council races could reach $2,700,000.”
The Mahan campaign also noticed that 49ers CEO Jed York is no longer writing the checks like he did in the past. The new ad sponsor is York’s family business, the DeBartolo Corporation.
“One member of the DeBartolo family was pardoned by President Donald Trump in 2020 for paying former Louisiana Governor Edwin Edwards $400,000 in exchange for a casino gambling license.”
The Mahan campaign is referring to York’s uncle Eddie DeBartolo. After a grand jury investigation, he pled guilty in 1998.
Debartolo had to give up control of the team to his sister, Denise Debartolo York, Jed’s mother.
One person who worked with both the Debartolos and the Yorks predicted that history would repeat itself.
“Notice how the amount is the same. It’s deja vu. All you need is a smart grand jury.”
[…] Source link […]
Eddie D’s bribery scandal was a DeBartolo family bribery scandal not a York family scandal.
The Yorks had nothing to do with it.
So it does not have anything to do with how the Yorks are behaving here in Santa Clara.
You do know Eddie D and Jed’s mom are brother and sister that would make her a DeBartolo. It impacted the family which is why they run the team now. You need to go back to the DeBartolo/York family history in Ohio. This is nothing new to that family’s ties with corruption.
Noah,
If you want to allege that Denise DeBartolo York took part in Eddie D’s bribing of a Louisiana governor you need to show some kind of proof for that. There are countless sisters who have nothing to do with their brother’s business dealings.
She got control of the team because Eddie D decided to give it up in exchange for other business holdings in the business portfolio they got from their father.
And even if Denise DeBartolo York was involved, it was as a DeBartolo, not a York. Unless you have something to show the world about how John York was involved in his brother in laws bribing of Edwin Edwards. Or Jed York. When he was eighteen years old.
What the Yorks are doing now looks plenty fishy. There is no need to link it to what Eddie D did in Louisiana twenty five years ago. And there is no call to link it either.
You have an excellent point. You analyze things well. The major donor committee name was changed to DeBartolo Corporation, which does beg the question. Your point would be even stronger if they had not done so. It was their choice.
Matt,
If a question was raised then pose it as an open question. Even better investigate the answer to that question and do not presume to know the offense is real and cluck your tongue at the offense all in the same breath.
There are a lot of questions about due process, propriety, and even corruption and legality to be raised by the behavior of the Forty Niners and the Yorks. The goal of having these questions answered is to have Santa Clara get full value out of Levis stadium and for our city to be run in an ethical manner.
There are ethical questions about Gillmor too. The best way for santaclaranews.org to encourage more Santa Clarans to demand these answers is to be seen as a credible voice in Santa Clara politics. To be seen this way Robert needs to hold himself to the high standards he is holding the Yorks, Becker, and the others to.
The partisan attacks are too transparently partisan. They are not a credit to the cause of holding the Forty Niners accountable.
The 49er management does not seem content purchasing just their football team, they are actively purchasing a local government team too. Judging by the rate of inflation and the numbers crossing our Southern boarder, their days are going to be numbered. Soccer will soon
be taking over!
Just think if the 49er money had gone to housing, schools, and directly to the community we might “like” the organization…
Arlene,
It’s all so sad. Think back a few years to 1983 to a movie call Trading Places. It stared Eddie Murphy and Dan Aykroyd. Also two wealthy Millionaires (Don Ameche and Ralph Bellamy) who made a bet to see who was right.
All kinds of collateral damage was done, lives, families, careers, marriages, and families destroyed. All over a $1 bet.
NFL Owners have no competition. They are guaranteed to make millions every years, eventually all adding up to making billions.
None of it comes down to how the teams perform on the field. All those TV contracts, corporate advertisers, and all the other assorted revenue streams that now have come into play are there to be divided up on an annual basis.
Teams that goes undefeated and the teams that goes winless all share in the same profits equally.
So where does the competition really take place? Again, let’s go back to the Movie Trading Places.
My guess is, who can brag they screw their Host City the most?
Every year at their annual meetings, someone has to walk into that room with just a little more swagger than anyone else. Someone has to be able to explain what they did new this past year to change the dynamics and local politics the most. Or maybe who they were able to buy off? What Politicians, or City Government were purchased, and how much they had to spend. Or how about what court cases they were either able to win, or settle out of court. All of this does huge damage and suck up the lives of all those involved.
I’m not making this up, let’s just take a look at our City this past year.
All really negative stuff, but kind of makes sense right? These are competitive people who want to compete.
Arlene, we are neighbors, feel talk to me any time you want.
I am working on some issues and could use your help.
Burt Field
burt.field@gmail.com
Burt,
You wrote: “Teams that goes undefeated and the teams that goes winless all share in the same profits equally. So where does the competition really take place? Again, let’s go back to the Movie Trading Places. My guess is, who can brag they screw their Host City the most?”
I would not be at all shocked if NFL owners bragged about how they got their cities to pay for their stadiums or give them massive tax breaks.
But teams that win on the field make more money for their owners and this is in fact the way in which team owners compete.
And if they are going to compete on the basis of their stadiums it will be on the basis of how they make money with their stadiums. The Yorks and the Davises are not going to try to make fun of Stan Kroenke because SoFi was not publicly funded and Levi’s and Allegiant were. Kroenke probably looks down his nose at the Yorks and the Davises for needing public financing for a stadium. For not leveraging their stadiums into much bigger real estate developments like Kroenke did with Hollywood Park.
I speculate that the other owners have little problem with how the Yorks have been acting in Santa Clara but I also think that it does not make the Yorks look good in front of other owners to have to nickel and dime the city of Santa Clara like have been doing.
Quadruple wow!!!! Where is the DA? Where is the grand jury? This has got to stop and be exposed on the National level!!!!
Election Day is just around the corner. Expose this corruption!
FPPC Complaint No. COM-09152022-02848: Anthony Becker, et al.
Switching names is already part of this fppc complaint involving Becker