PD Editorial: The high cost of hosting the big game

When NFL owners and announced in May 2013 that Super Bowl 50 would be played in the Bay Area, it was understood that most of the pre-game events would occur in San Francisco while the game itself would be played in the 49ers’ new Santa Clara stadium.

Still, Bay Area sports fans were hoping for a little more.

Given that just three months earlier the 49ers had played in Super Bowl XLVII - losing in agonizing fashion 34-31- local fans hoped that, once again, the Niners would be playing in the very contest that they were hosting. After all, that was the case in 1985 when the Super Bowl came to Stanford Stadium and the 49ers were there in all their Bill Walsh-designed, Joe Montana-driven glory. It was a true Bay Area celebration.

But that has not been the case this time.

Due largely to front-office dramatics and off-season retirements that decimated a championship-caliber squad, the chances of the 49ers playing in this contest disappeared early in the season. Some would say they were over by August.

Meanwhile, the much-celebrated game, this year featuring the Denver Broncos and the Carolina Panthers, has not been without local controversy.

The cost of hosting the Super Bowl, estimated at about $5 million for San Francisco alone, has created tension in the City by the Bay. Locals resent the escalation of prices at local restaurants, the influx of visitors paying astronomical prices for hotels and vacation rentals and the efforts to remove the homeless from the street.

Studies show that San Francisco is the second wealthiest city in the country per capita behind only San Jose. The cost of an average two-bedroom apartment reached $5,000 a month last fall, the highest in the nation. With that has come rapid escalation of housing costs, which has contributed to growing homeless population.

Many homeless traditionally can be found along or near the foot of Market Street, but much of that area has been cleared out to make room for Super Bowl City, a massive village of displays and vendors that pays homage both to the Bay Area as well as to the National Football League. (Super Bowl City even includes a wine lounge hosted by the Sonoma County tourism leaders and local grape growers, who joined in a nearly $1 million effort to promote local wines.)

What also has frustrated San Francisc ans is how easily the city has been willing to bend the rules for the National Football League, which, after all, is a $62 billion industry. Permits that usually are expensive and difficult to obtain for most organizations, appeared to be handed out with few questions asked. Fees were brushed aside. As an example of the push-back, many of the Super Bowl 50 statues around town have been vandalized, including one in Alamo Square that was targeted so often it was finally removed. One of the primary reasons: The city reportedly had waived installation fees to place it in the public park.

All of this is in a city that lost in excess of $10 million in hosting the America’s Cup yacht race and where the net cost benefit of being a Super Bowl host (or close-to-host) remains a matter of debate. When locals consider this as well as the cost of actually getting a ticket to Sunday’s game - now running at more than $3,000 for an upper-deck seat - it’s easy to ask some basic questions. Such as, it’s clear what the NFL is getting out of this. But what about the rest of the Bay Area?

Yes, it’s fun to be ground zero for America’s biggest tailgate party. But we can wait another 30 years before we do it again.