The city of San Antonio is using $31 million from Spurs Sports & Entertainment to buy property that’s crucial to the NBA franchise’s plan to build an arena downtown surrounded by housing, retail space, offices and hotel rooms.
The City Council voted unanimously Thursday to give staff the go-ahead to make an offer to the federal government for about 5.7 acres in the Hemisfair area, paving the way for mixed-use development near the planned $1.3 billion arena.
The move would give the city and the Hemisfair Park Area Redevelopment Corp., an organization set up by the city to redevelop the site of the 1968 World’s Fair, control of most of the land in the area…