San Diego officials have chosen Sept. 11 as the deadline for the NFL’s Chargers to agree on a new stadium in Mission Valley and thus commit to staying in San Diego.

City officials told the Chargers on Tuesday the two sides need to reach a deal by the September deadline on the proposed $1.1 billion stadium in order to meet legal requirements that would enable a Jan. 12 special election to be held for the stadium.

City and San Diego county officials also outlined a financing plan, according to NFL senior vice president Eric Grubman, for “a public/private project requiring very significant funding from NFL and Chargers sources.”

The Sept. 11 deadline, other key dates and the financing plan were outlined by city officials during a 3 1/2 hour meeting with Grubman on Tuesday in San Diego that was also attended by Chargers representatives. City and county officials and members of a stadium task force appointed by San Diego Mayor Kevin Faulconer made presentations to Grubman and the team on four primary areas: stadium design, an environmental impact report on the venue, funding the project and what the city plans to present to a six-owner NFL committee on the Los Angeles situation during an Aug. 10 meeting in Chicago.

“Lots of questions were asked, but there were no negotiations,” Grubman said in an email to the Register.

Grubman told city and task force officials to focus – leading up to the Chicago meeting – on the financing plan and reducing the risk of the plan being invalidated by the courts.

The Chargers walked away from negotiations with the city and the task force last month, calling the city’s EIR timetable “completely unrealistic” and inconsistent with the California Environmental Quality Act. Carmen Policy, the point man for a proposed stadium in Carson backed by the Chargers and Raiders, told the Register last week he is confident the NFL will approve the two teams relocating to Los Angeles County this fall.

“We’ve taken our case straight to the NFL and league officials have encouraged us to continue moving forward,” Faulconer said. “The game isn’t over. We’re entering the fourth quarter and time remains to negotiate a fair and responsible agreement for voter approval if the Chargers return to the negotiating table. Our environmental report is on schedule and we will continue moving forward toward a stadium solution.”

City and county officials on Tuesday said they hope to release a draft of an EIR on Aug. 10. That would require the CEQA-mandated 45-day public review period. The Sept. 11 date is important because that is the deadline to place the EIR on the city council’s docket for a Sept. 14 meeting. To call a Jan. 12 special election, the City Council must begin the process by directing the City Attorney to prepare ordinances by Sept. 14. Faulconer said he will not ask the city council to the stadium proposal on the ballot without a deal between the city and the Chargers. If an agreement is reached the city council would call for a special election on Oct. 12 or 13. The final EIR would also have to be certified by then.

“Timing/Approvals were discussed,” Grubman wrote in the email. “They emphasized that this is a thorough EIR procedure, and that it deals with the replacement of an existing stadium at an existing site.”

But team and league officials have several concerns about the EIR issue, the most pressing being timing. San Diego officials are trying to do in less than a month what has taken other California stadium projects on a similar scale more than a year to complete. In the past 10 years there have been three EIRs completed on proposed NFL stadiums in California: the Anschutz Entertainment Group’s Farmers Field project in downtown Los Angeles, a plan proposed by real estate developer Ed Roski for a City of Industry stadium and Levi’s Stadium, the San Francisco 49ers’ year-old facility in Santa Clara. The average time it took to complete the EIRs for those three projects was 15 months.

City and county officials told Grubman and the Chargers that the expedited EIR process is possible because it is on the “reconstruction of an existing facility of a smaller capacity on the same site,” referring to the proposed stadium’s proximity to Qualcomm Stadium, the Chargers’ current home. AECOM, a planning firm hired by the city, has more than 90 employees, many working extended hours on the project to complete it to be released for public comment on Aug. 10.

Another major concern is that the EIR will face several challenges in court, especially given the condensed period in which it was completed. Assembly Speaker Toni Atkins said she would push for legislation that would limit the window in which the EIR could be challenged. The Farmers Field and City of Industry projects received similar legislation.

“We want the Chargers to stay in San Diego if the right agreement can be reached,” Atkins said. “As I have said before, if an agreement is reached, I am committed to making sure San Diego can benefit from state legislation that is consistent with what other cities have received for their sports facilities.”

But there remains a concern within the NFL that a lawsuit challenging the EIR or the stadium’s funding plan could drag out in California’s court system for more than a year. The stadium’s funding and cost are also likely to be greeted with skepticism next month in Chicago. There is a widespread belief within the NFL that the city and county cannot build a stadium for $1.1 billion, especially since the project also requires tearing down Qualcomm.

The price tag for the Carson project is $1.75 billion. A proposed stadium in Inglewood backed by Rams owner Stan Kroenke would cost $1.86 billion. Levi’s Stadium came with a $1.3 billion price tag.

Contact the writer: sreid@ocregister.com

Note: This version of the story clarifies the timing of the environmental impact report and deadlines for a special election.