Coliseum Chided Over USC Deal

A Superior Court judge has taken the commission that oversees the state-owned Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum to task for holding secret meetings to negotiate a lease of the building to the University of Southern California.

The commission recently inked a 98-year deal with the school that requires the university to make roughly $100 million in physical improvements to the Coliseum, pay $1 million rent annually to the state and assume all financial obligations for operations and maintenance.

Photo: facebook.com/lacoliseum

But the deal was done behind mostly closed doors and Judge Luis Lavin said commissioners had “driven a Mack truck through” the state’s open meetings law and not offered the lease to public bidders.

“We’re talking about a public asset being transferred to a private entity with no public bidding,” he said Oct. 3. “It looks like this was a train on a track to get this to USC.”

The Los Angeles Times and a public forum advocacy group have sued to have the agreement thrown out in light of the secret negotiations.

Lavin said in court he isn’t likely to revoke the lease as commissioners did allow public comments on the USC agreement before signing it.