Ron Burkle sued – again – over stadium after abandoning Sacramento, Major League Soccer
The lawsuits are starting to pile up on Ron Burkle after the billionaire investor bailed out of Sacramento’s Major League Soccer effort.
M.A. Mortenson Co., a Minnesota-based construction company that was supposed to build Sacramento’s MLS stadium, sued Burkle and his business partner Matt Alvarez last week, demanding nearly $1.4 million for unpaid bills.
It’s the second lawsuit filed against the Burkle group over his aborted effort to bring an MLS expansion franchise to the city. Icon Venue Group, the company that was going to develop the stadium, sued Burkle and Alvarez for $2.3 million in June, claiming it hadn’t yet been paid for preparatory work done on the proposed $300 million stadium.
Mortenson’s lawsuit, filed in U.S. District Court in Sacramento, says the contractor began talking with Burkle’s group in 2018 about building a stadium at the downtown railyard, with a design based on the MLS stadium that Mortenson built in 2017 for the new Minnesota United FC franchise.
Two years later, MLS Commissioner Don Garber announced that Sacramento Republic FC, the city’s minor-league club, would be granted an expansion slot in MLS.
The contractor acknowledged in the lawsuit that a formal construction contract was never completed. But Burkle’s investment company, Yucaipa Cos., was well aware that Mortenson was working on the project, the lawsuit claims.
“Throughout the summer and full of 2020, Yucaipa would consistently represent that the project would commence in a ‘few weeks,’ and that the parties should just focus on finalizing the Construction Agreement, with payments following thereafter,” the lawsuit says.
Burkle’s spokesman wasn’t immediately available for comment.
Mortensen said it began submitting bills to Icon Venue in June 2020. Mortenson’s lawsuit targets Burkle, Alvarez and two of Burkle’s companies, but not Icon.
Burkle’s expansion agreement with MLS was never formalized. Six months ago, the Burkle group told MLS it was backing out “based on issues with the project related to COVID-19.”
Mayor Darrell Steinberg has vowed to find a new deep-pocketed “whale” to replace Burkle, and Garber said in April that the league isn’t giving up on Sacramento.
“There’s still a lot of energy in Sacramento, it’s a good soccer market,” Garber said. “Mayor Darrell Steinberg is very focused on trying to put another ownership group together. We’re going to work with him to see what can be achieved, if another group can be put together to reach an agreement with the city and others.”