San Diego city leaders, led by Mayor Kevin Faulconer, have spent precious time and – even more precious- taxpayer money on a seemingly fruitless attempt to keep the Chargers in town. Like a teenaged boy chasing a pretty girl, the Mayor looks desperate for attention from someone who’s clearly just not that into him.
Although some arguments can be made for trying to work out a deal to keep a professional football team here, none of the proposals floated so far come close to making financial sense for taxpayers. San Diegans have a long history of wishing big but refusing to pay the costs for making it a reality.

While our city leaders have focused on this last-ditch effort to woo the Spansos family, critical issues that are guaranteed to have a real financial impact on our regional economy have been ignored or relegated to the back burner. That’s a mistake.

Take for example the desperately needed street improvements in Otay Mesa that could help improve the cross border commerce heading back and forth to maquiladora plants in Tijuana.

The qualifiable economic impact of cross border business in the San Diego region equals the estimated economic impact of 18 Super Bowls – every year!
And the number of local jobs linked to this cross border commerce total 4 times the number of employees of Google.

More importantly, as a trading partner, Mexico trade is a much more synergistic relationship than with any other country. The trade deficit between us is about $48 billion, meaning exports to Mexico are closer to what we import from them.
Compared to the $306.7 billion annual trade deficit with China, trade with our neighbor is much more beneficial to our own economy. By buying a disproportionate amount of goods from China, we are helping build up their national wealth while at the same time increasing our own military funding to keep counter their growing world influence. We are funding our own military and economic demise.

International trade may seem like a national issue but street improvements up to the border are the city’s responsibility. More than 600,000 loaded trucks use the Otay Mesa border crossing each year. The current improvement plan has been adopted by the city but it relies on partial funding from planned developments in the Otay area. Until and unless those projects get built, complete funding hasn’t yet been allocated by the City.

This funding issue is what’s most frustrating. The costs for the street improvements are estimated to be between $20-$30 million dollars. Compared to proposals to fund hundreds of millions of dollars for a football stadium, these border street improvements are a no-brainer.

Mayor Faulconer should refocus attention on the critical infrastructure improvements needed near the border. No other local street  projects can deliver anywhere near the measurable results to our economy.
After all, having a football team in town has questionable financial impact. Experts disagree on the true annual economic benefits as most spectators are local or from close proximity, including Orange County and Los Angeles, so they don’t tend to stay overnight in hotels for games.

So the big payoff for San Diego, it’s argued, can come from future Super Bowl games, both from out of town visitors and television exposure. But both those economic impacts are hard to measure and, even if they happen, result in low-paying service jobs not long term research, manufacturing, or financial jobs created by international trade.

We need better paying jobs in San Diego so our families can afford to live in this increasingly expensive region. Our public policy should support that premise not fight it. Marketing San Diego as a tourist destination leads to a lower standard of living for our working families.

We should be attracting high-tech companies, manufacturing facilities, and corporate headquarters with our strong schools, stable political environment, and unbeatable climate. Let’s raise the bar, not lower it.

Chasing tourist dollars can make San Diego more stratified, with more rich but many more working poor. That’s not how to build America’s Finest City.
San Diegans need better jobs with better pay more than they need a football team. Maybe with higher income levels, more San Diegans could actually afford to take in a Chargers game, even if it ends up being in LA.