The Warriors were planning on playing in their new Mission Bay arena at the start of the 2018-19 season.
But that is not going to happen.
On Friday, Golden State President Rick Welts told Tim Kawakami of the Bay Area News Group that because of the recent lawsuit field against the franchise and the City of San Francisco, the new target date for the arena opening is the Fall of 2019.
“This is a dispute over whether San Francisco and the Warriors followed the law when it comes to environmental regulations and whether this was an appropriate decision by the City of San Francisco,” Mission Bay Alliance spokesman, Sam Singer, said last week. “We believe the decision was rushed, it was rubber-stamped and it’s the worst planning decision in the history of San Francisco.”
The Warriors, claiming the Mission Bay Alliance is off base, issued a response:
“During three years of intense public scrutiny, the Warriors arena won approval from 100 percent of boards, agencies and commissions that considered the matter: the Board of Supervisors, the Office of Community Investment and Infrastructure, the Mission Bay Citizens Committee, the San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency and the Planning, Entertainment, Port and Public Utilities Commissions.
“The decision of our elected leaders to bring the Warriors home to San Francisco will be upheld by the courts, and this frivolous lawsuit brought by a secretive group of wealthy donors will fail.”
