A proposed plan to bring a San Diego State University extension campus and football stadium to Mission Valley gathered enough petition signatures to submit to the city, officials announced Friday.
Friends of SDSU, the group behind the signature gathering efforts, said petitioners have retrieved more than 100,000 signatures. The group needs 71,000 valid signatures from registered San Diego voters to get the SDSU West citizens’ initiative onto the ballot next year.
Signatures will first need to be verified by the San Diego County Registrar’s Office.
The initiative, fully titled the SDSU West Campus Research Center, Stadium and River Park Initiative, aims to transform the current site of SDCCU Stadium into a campus with apartments, classrooms and a football stadium.
SDSU President Sally Roush said the project would be funded by a public and private partnership. The only bond financing could be to build the stadium.
"No tuition dollars or tuition increase or anything to do with tuition would be devoted to this site," Roush said.
The project would be developed in phases with the initial phase being the river park, a community park and a football stadium that could house a professional team. The plan includes 95,000 square feet of retail space and two hotels and could potentially include a campus innovation center and a housing site.
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Friends of SDSU said the signatures will be turned in to the Registrar’s office after the New Year’s holiday. Once verified, the signatures will be certified by the city clerk and passed to San Diego City Council for a vote.
City Council can either approve the measure outright or send it to a ballot in November 2018.
An initiative for the same site with a similar goal went through that process earlier this year. City Council voted 8-0 to send the SoccerCity initiative to the ballot next year, denying their bid for a special election this year.
If the SDSU West initiative is sent to a ballot, it would compete with SoccerCity.
Soccer City also calls for redevelopment of the Mission Valley site into housing, hotels, retail space, a river park and a soccer stadium. The group behind the initiative hopes to bring a Major League Soccer team to San Diego.
