Hollywood Park was winning one fight and losing another, both by slim margins, as vote counting continued Tuesday night on two ballot measures in Inglewood.
According to results posted by the Los Angeles County registrar shortly after 10:30 p.m., Measure AT was losing 51.9% to 48.1%, a margin of 583 votes, and Measure BB was losing 51% to 49%, a margin of 307.
Measure AT would mean more ticket taxes for big events in Inglewood, home to SoFi Stadium, Intuit Dome and the Forum. The city of Inglewood wants that.
Measure BB would bar the city from allowing billboard advertising on sidewalks, medians and the like. Owners of those sports and entertainment venues, who have their own sponsorship deals, are backing that measure.
Meanwhile, City Councilmember Gloria D. Gray led incumbent Mayor James T. Butts Jr. 34.6% to 29.8%, putting them on an early track for a runoff election in March.
Los Angeles County won’t finalize results until the end of November.
The ballot measures were spawned by a feud between Inglewood and Hollywood Park, the nearly 300-acre development anchored by SoFi Stadium and owned by Rams owner Stan Kroenke.
The fight started last year over billboards. Inglewood signed a deal with Wow Media for 60 digital signs carrying 108 screens, some of them bus-shelter-sized kiosks. Others are street displays up to 22 feet tall on sidewalks and medians.
SoFi Stadium, Intuit Dome and the Forum sued to block the deal, arguing the signs would undercut their individual sponsors that paid for exclusivity. A judge sided with the city and an appeal is underway.
Measure BB, short for “Billboard Blight,” aimed to restrict billboard advertising on public property. It qualified with nearly 13,000 signatures.
The Wow deal runs 20 years with two 10-year options, so it could be around for 40 years.
“It’s biblical in length,” said John Shallman, the political strategist managing the “Yes on BB” campaign. “You go back 40 years. We didn’t even have the internet. We didn’t have cellphones.”
Skip Miller, lead attorney for the city, said the kiosks “blend in with the surrounding areas” and connect to a network that provides traffic and safety information.
Measure AT, backed by the city, would lift a $15-million cap on the 10% admission tax the stadium pays. Hollywood Park sees it as punishment for challenging the billboard deal.
The billboard fight led to a bigger one. Last month, a Los Angeles County Superior Court judge voided the 2015 development agreement that cleared the way for SoFi Stadium, citing a 2018 Moreno Valley decision.
Under the 2015 agreement, Hollywood Park paid up front for roads, water lines, streetlights and event-day police and emergency services, with the city agreeing to eventually reimburse Kroenke for those expenses. Now that the agreement has been voided, the city argues it isn’t required to pay.
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