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The San Francisco Office of Community Investment and Infrastructure oversight board vote to approve the Warriors' environmental impact review helps push the franchise's Mission Bay arena forward. The arena has been estimated to cost over one billion dollars; the Warriors hope to open the stadium in time for the 2018-19 season.
Due to widespread concerns that the Warriors were not doing enough to address the negative impact the stadium would have on access to the nearby hospital, as well as the overall traffic congestion, last month the franchise partnered with UCSF and the Mayor's Office to create a special circumstances cap and a $10 million fund to monitor and improve traffic flow. This was likely critical in the passage of the Warriors' environmental impact review Tuesday.
Although this is a critical and positive step for the Warriors to move ahead with their privately financed arena plans, their opponents, Mission Bay Alliance has been preparing for this exact situation.
The smorgasbord of UCSF donors, former administrators and current faculty has ten days, until November 13, to appeal the O.C.I.I. oversight board's appeal of the EIR. Furthermore, with a team of high-powered attorneys, including the renowned David Boies, hired for this reason, the Mission Bay Alliance is prepared to challenge the project on legal grounds.
The Warriors won the battle for approval of the EIR. The outcome of the war for Mission Bay, however, has yet to be determined.
Update: The Mission Bay Alliance has released a statement on the passage of the Warriors' EIR:
"OCII's certification makes it clear [San Francisco] isn't interested in holding the Warriors accountable for the problems the arena will cause in the Mission Bay community," Bruce Spaulding, a Mission Bay Alliance consultant and the former Senior Vice Chancellor of advancement and planning at UCSF. "The OCII approval is just one step in a long process. Mission Bay Alliance is not going to back down, and we will continue to raise our concerns about the project with the Board of Supervisors and the courts, if necessary."