The University of South Alabama Board of Trustees on Friday unanimously approved a resolution authorizing school president Tony Waldrop to begin awarding bids toward the construction of an on-campus football stadium, a project with the goal of being completed for the 2020 season.

While Friday's vote does not make an on-campus stadium for the Jaguars a 100 percent certainty, it is a "tremendous step forward" in that direction, USA athletics director Joel Erdmann said. The school must still secure much of the project's proposed $73-million funding, which would come from repurposed athletic funds and private and corporate donations, as well as additional pledges from city and county government.

"There's a lot of work to be done," Erdmann said. "There's resources and funding that needs to be identified, but we've been given permission to proceed with ground work and the first step toward our goal."

Erdmann told the board Friday that while meetings with City of Mobile and Mobile County officials had taken place, neither body has yet committed to providing the school with a portion of the funding needed. South Alabama is asking for from $5 million-$10 million from both the city and county for the project, primarily to be used for debt service.

Mobile County Commission president Connie Hudson told AL.com Friday morning that the university has approached all three commissioners individually, but "we've not had a discussion about it." She didn't know when such an official discussion might occur, she said.

"I certainly support all their efforts," she said. The challenge will be "to see what our capacity is" to assist with stadium funding, given the county's other current and future financial obligations, including funding for economic development projects.

"At this point I don't know the answer to that," she said.

Mobile Mayor Sandy Stimpson confirmed through Twitter on Friday afternoon that the city "has been approached by the University of South Alabama to consider participating in a public-private partnership for construction of a new football stadium to be located on the university campus." He did not offer any immediate additional comment.

Since the program's inception in 2009, South Alabama has played home football games at city-owned Ladd-Peebles Stadium. The 70-year-old stadium seats 40,000 and is located a 20-to-30-minute drive from campus.

The Jaguars averaged a little over 17,000 fans for home games in 2017, and have sold out Ladd-Peebles Stadium just once in their history, for a 2014 game against Mississippi State. Erdmann said discussions about an on-campus stadium have been taking place literally since the South Alabama program launched nearly a decade ago.

"It's literally been the persistent, never-ending question," Erdmann said. "But on a sincere side, it's been seriously considered and examined for over three years. Site visits, stadium visits, consultants, first renditions, second renditions, cost estimates, back-and-forth, back-and-forth and the very committed, hard work by a lot of people who now have an end product. And now we just need to get there."

Waldrop called the potential on-campus stadium a "win for the whole community."

"If we do raise the additional money we need and are able to build a football stadium, not only is it a win for our university, I think it's a win for the whole community," Waldrop said during the board meeting. "It provides an opportunity to have a state-of-the-art stadium. It's also something that would bring in revenue for the city and the county.

"The schools with on-campus stadiums, they see a drastic increase in student life on campus. It really makes a difference. I know we're going to win (football games), and what better to do that than in a new facility on campus."

The reaction from students has also been a positive one, Student Government Association president Grace Newcombe said.

"It's a really exciting possibility," Newcombe said. "I know it will increase attendance, because you won't have to make the 25-minute commute to Ladd-Peebles. It will increase 'Jag Pride' from the students, being able to express our full support of our athletic department on campus. It's a convenient, close proximity facility."

The goal listed in the Board of Trustees resolution is to begin construction on the stadium in July, in order to complete the 18-to-24-month project in time for the 2020 season. The stadium would seat approximately 25,000 and would be located on the former site of the intramural fields, just down the hill from the South Alabama Football Field House.

Erdmann said that area of campus -- and the campus in general -- is well set-up to accommodate the stadium, as well as ample parking and tailgating areas. Work on infrastructure such as access roads and the expansion of electrical and water and sewer capacity has already been considered and plotted out.

"We've had the great benefit of having a university that has a large footprint from an acreage standpoint," Erdmann said. "We're not building buildings on top of other buildings, we have space to spread out. And we do have space for parking. I think our campus lends itself to a great tailgating and game day environment."

Erdmann said the proposed stadium would combine elements of several newer and more modestly-sized facilities at other schools he and his team have visited in-person. Specifically, he cited Southern Methodist's Gerald J. Ford Stadium, Florida Atlantic's FAU Stadium, Central Florida's Spectrum Stadium, Tulane's Yulman Stadium and Colorado State Stadium.

"Those are five stadiums that have been recently built or significantly renovated and we pulled aspects from those and are inserting them into our concept for enhancing fan experience," Erdmann said. "We want to make it a very social environment where students can mingle and move around -- spacious concourses, an end zone terrace section that we think will be a tremendous addition, but also the upscale amenities that fans are used to having -- clubs, suites, loges, so on and so forth."

The resolution approved Friday also left open the possibility that the Dollar General Bowl and Reese's Senior Bowl -- both of which also currently play at Ladd-Peebles -- could move to the new South Alabama stadium once it is complete. Dollar General Bowl president Jerry Silverstein expressed interest in that idea recently, while new Senior Bowl executive director Jim Nagy said Thursday he wouldn't rule it out.

The stadium would also serve as a recruiting tool for the Jaguars, and would be part of an ever-growing athletic complex in the northwest corner of campus that includes the South Alabama Field House and the Jaguar Training Center, a covered practice facility scheduled to open in July. On Thursday, first-year USA football coach Steve Campbell called a new stadium " the last piece of the puzzle ... to make us second to nobody in the country as far as football facilities."

"We're a month away from completing the largest indoor practice facility in the state of Alabama," Campbell said. "We've got tremendous practice facilities already. With the addition of the new indoor (practice facility), the on-campus stadium is really the only missing part."

AL.com's Lawrence Specker contributed to this report.