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Editorial: SDSU West advances for the right reasons. Thanks, Mara Elliott.

San Diego City Attorney Mara Elliott poses for a photo in Balboa Park.
San Diego City Attorney Mara Elliott poses for a photo in Balboa Park.
(K.C. Alfred / U-T)

Those who questioned city attorney’s motives owe her an apology

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In a turning point for San Diego State University and the entire region, the San Diego City Council unanimously approved selling the city’s 135-acre stadium site in Mission Valley to SDSU for $88.2 million Friday. The welcome step forward ratifies voters’ 2018 support for such a deal. After a buildout of 15 years, the $3.5 billion SDSU West project will include a 35,000-seat stadium, 4,600 housing units, 1.6 million square feet of office space, a 400-room hotel, 95,000 square feet of retail, 80 acres of parks and open space, and 13,000-plus parking spots. There will also be a 34-acre, city-owned river park paid for by SDSU. Further council votes are necessary, but construction is likely to begin this summer.

On Sunday, The San Diego Union-Tribune Editorial Board strongly backed City Attorney Mara Elliott and her warning that what SDSU called its final offer included provisions that could expose the city to future legal claims over environmental problems and would exempt SDSU from some utility fees, shifting costs to ratepayers. We dismissed criticism of Elliott by Councilwoman Barbara Bry and others who said the city attorney was trying to kill the deal, and wrote that she was doing her job for a city whose leaders have made huge, costly errors in big deals. Her attention to detail should have been applauded and emulated, not attributed to malign motives.

This week, Elliott got many of the concessions she wanted. “We took the time needed get the deal right so that San Diegans and future generations are not saddled with a rushed and shortsighted deal that we later regret,” she said Friday.

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The city attorney deserves applause, and her critics, starting with Bry, owe her an apology. Since so much of this is politics, that is unlikely, so we’ll be satisfied with a good outcome after a messy fight.

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