Two decades after owner Arte Moreno decided that the Angels should play under the Los Angeles name, Anaheim’s elected officials are pursuing two ways to reclaim their city’s team name.
Avelino Valencia, whose district includes Angel Stadium, has introduced state legislation that would require any sale or new lease of the stadium building to be conditional on the team reverting to the Anaheim Angels name.
Meanwhile, Anaheim Mayor Ashleigh Aitken asked the city’s attorney to investigate whether the Angels violated their lease agreement by removing Anaheim’s name from legal documents.
Valencia’s bill – called the “Home Run for Anaheim Act” – aims to approve what the city of Anaheim could not negotiate in its negative agreement with Moreno in 2019: If the team’s owner wants to improve the parking lots around the city’s stadium, the team must carry the name of the city.
“The Angels have been supported by the city and its citizens for 60 years,” Valencia said. “I think it’s fair to the residents that, if the team wants to play in Anaheim and have a partnership with Anaheim when it comes to the future development of that stadium and the buildings around it, the name should match that.”
Angel spokeswoman Marie Garvey said the team had no comment.
The Angels’ stadium lease runs through 2032, with the team holding options to extend the lease through 2038.
The city and team had agreed to a deal in which the Angels would remain in Anaheim until 2050, the team would purchase the 150-acre stadium site for $150 million, repair or replace the stadium, and build a ballpark village over the parking lots.
The government refused, however. The Surplus Land Act requires that public property be sold first and made available for affordable housing, and the city negotiates with Angels only. The city agreed to a $96 million settlement.
The Anaheim City Council finally killed the deal three years later, after an FBI investigation revealed — and former Mayor Harry Sidhu admitted in a plea deal — that Sidhu had provided confidential information to the team “so that the Angels could purchase Angel Stadium on terms favorable to the Angels” and that he “expected a $1,000,000 campaign contribution from the Angels.” The government did not suspect any wrongdoing by the Angels.
Valencia’s bill was developed in consultation with city leaders and publicly endorsed by Aitken and former Mayors Tom Daly and Tom Tait.
Under the bill, if the city could obtain an exemption from the Surplus Land Act, a team could not purchase or lease Angel Stadium unless “the materials refer to that team as the Anaheim Angels.”
The bill would only apply to Anaheim, and its provisions would not apply “if the city of Anaheim is able to reach an agreement with the Major League Baseball team known as the Los Angeles Angels regarding its merger.”
Valencia said the city could file a non-payment lawsuit because he believes the Surplus Land Act is designed for small buildings such as school sites and municipal offices. He said the community should have a greater say in how such land should be used, or it could mean less housing in the Angel Stadium area.
“Of course we need more houses because it is expensive to live but the number of houses [in Anaheim] that increased in the last 10, 15 years, I think it has reduced some of that,” said Valencia.
“I think the people of Anaheim think that Anaheim is doing its fair share of housing development. I don’t want to tarnish the idea by saying, ‘We don’t need housing anymore. We’ve been very busy in that space. But I think people will be happy that we want to make the Angels have Anaheim in the name.’
In 2005, after city officials rejected Moreno’s request to change the team’s name from the Anaheim Angels to the Los Angeles Angels, the owner adopted the name “Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim”. The city sued and lost, with a judge finding that the Angels did not violate the stadium lease’s requirement that the team’s name “include the word Anaheim in it.”
When the city sued the Angels and asked for an injunction to stop the name change pending trial, Orange County Superior Court Judge Peter Polos denied the request. He did, however, warn the Angels that he would issue an order if the team dropped “Anaheim” and simply called themselves the Los Angeles Angels.
In 2006, after the city lost the case, the Polos decided that the club could market itself under any name it wanted. In 2016, the team called themselves the Los Angeles Angels. In county records, the legal entity is Angels Baseball LP.
“When it comes to the official designation, and how they are registered, I want us to look at how Anaheim is used by the team in any official installation,” said Aitken, “and what their requirements are to do that.”
When Aitken asked City Atty. Robert Fabela to investigate, Fabela said the matter will be discussed in the cell “as a possible crime.”
