This Week in the Mercury

Blood, Honey, and a Trojan Horse

Film

Blood, Honey, and a Trojan Horse

Angelina Jolie Brings a Dog into the Bosnian War


The Final Frontier

Music

The Final Frontier

Vektor Is Light Years Ahead of the Fleet



  |  

Wednesday, March 11, 2009

News / Politics Major League Soccer Showdown

Posted by Matt Davis on Wed, Mar 11, 2009 at 11:46 AM

45 people are signed up to testify at this morning's Major League Soccer hearing, which means a decision is at least an hour away, possibly two. So far, there's no indication of which way the vote may go, although my money is on a 4-1 yes vote, but not without a fight...
10b4/1236796272-counciltestimony.jpg
SALTZMAN: Faced some remarkably Johnsonian body language from Randy Leonard when he probed the deal...

Nick Fish and Dan Saltzman, the two "undecided" commissioners, have been grilling the proponents of the deal on its details for the last two hours. Fish asked Steve Maser, the chairman of the Major League Soccer Taskforce, whether it had considered any alternatives to the $15m in urban renewal funding that is to be drawn from a yet-to-be created urban renewal district including PGE park, for example.

"Of all the pieces of the financing, that seems to be the most vulnerable," said Fish. "In that it's in a district yet to be created with potential legal challenges to be faced."

"How do we have a good faith discussion with the county and the school district," asked Commissioner Saltzman, "When you've already allotted $15m of that money? We've sort of jumped ahead of them, haven't we?"

Mayor Sam Adams said that it's not unusual for city council to "have a desire" to influence the formation of urban renewal districts.

Fish also asked whether the task force had learned anything from the recent decisions of Miami, Montreal and Atlanta to pass on Major League soccer, and whether there was a market research study done into the viability of the sport in Portland. Maser conceded that he didn't know whether a market research study had been done, but that he had seen some "persuasive" numbers suggesting soccer attendance would triple or quadruple if MLS came to town.

"The question of projected attendances is interesting, but fortunately quite irrelevant," interrupted Leonard. "[Paulson]'ll make the payments to PGE whether there's one attendee or 25,000. Our economic interests are met."

"These urban renewal decisions aren't strictly the council's any more," said Saltzman. "We've been litigated twice, and Salem is looking at this. We don't have total control over our destiny, now."

"But we do have control of the process we set up as we consider this," said Adams.

Amanda Fritz bought some soccer scarves into the council chamber. I'm not sure why. She hasn't pulled them out yet. County Chair Ted Wheeler is also in the audience, and yet to testify, along with a lot of people with Timbers scarves. More later...if you can't wait, you can always watch the hearings live at the city's website here.

 

Comments (15) RSS

Oldest First Unregistered On Registered On Add a comment
1
The live hearing feed is terribly choppy, almost unwatchable, at least for me. Feel free to post highlights!
Posted by luckymike on March 11, 2009 at 12:09 PM · Report
2
Wheeler and Leonard were going at it. It was pretty awesome.

Leonard is a fucking snake. I now officially don't respect at least 3 councilors. We'll see what the other 2 have to say.

Basically the city is issuing veiled threats to not partner with the County in the future.
Posted by Blabby on March 11, 2009 at 12:25 PM · Report
3
Nick Fish seems to have his head on pretty straight.
Posted by Blabby on March 11, 2009 at 12:33 PM · Report
4
... unlike Wheeler, who apparently couldn't be bothered to attend any of the task force meetings, yet was nice enough to show up today to get his ass handed to him by Leonard.
Posted by Jack Acid on March 11, 2009 at 12:47 PM · Report
5
My personal subjective elected officials scorecard so far:

Ted Wheeler +12
Nick Fish +7
Amanda Fritz +2
Dan Saltzman +2
Sam Adams -5
Randy Leonard -17
Posted by Euphonius on March 11, 2009 at 12:48 PM · Report
6
Soccer? Boring. Save my money.
Posted by kungfu on March 11, 2009 at 1:04 PM · Report
7
wheeler went home holding his ass, handed to him with vigour by mister leonard.
Posted by ninj on March 11, 2009 at 1:23 PM · Report
8
.".. unlike Wheeler, who apparently couldn't be bothered to attend any of the task force meetings"

He has a county to run. He knew the process was going on, what he's surprised about is the sudden inclusion of serious money from a UR district which doesn't exist yet, and has had no public airing or debate.
Posted by Blabby on March 11, 2009 at 1:47 PM · Report
9
kungfu - you seem to be forgetting that the expense comes from wanting to keep baseball, not soccer. MLS soccer would stand a much better chance of making money than the Beavers, so it's clear what the priority would be. Paulson's money would happily be enough to convert PGE park to soccer-only; the UR money is only needed to build a baseball stadium in the Rose Quarter. No city money spent would likely leave Portland with an MLS soccer team but no Beavers.

Personally, I'd be fine with that, actually...
Posted by Stu on March 11, 2009 at 1:54 PM · Report
10
Actually Stu, quite a lot of UR money is proposed to go to updating the soccer stadium as well.
Posted by Blabby on March 11, 2009 at 1:56 PM · Report
11
Blabby - in the current proposal, that's true. It doesn't seem to be specified which of the two stadia each bit of money is spent on. But in an alternative situation where the council rejected this idea from the start, Paulson could (and I suspect would) have kicked the Beavers out of PGE Park and renovated it for MLS, putting in the same amount of personal money he is now. So the difference between the current scenario and the no-city-money alternative is that this way the Beavers get to stay in Portland. We're paying for the Beavers here, not for the Timbers.
Posted by Stu on March 11, 2009 at 2:16 PM · Report
12
Stu, you do know that Paulson OWNS the Beavers, right?
Posted by Blabby on March 11, 2009 at 2:22 PM · Report
13
Yes. Which is why he has the power to shut them down / move them to another city if it would enable him to make more money by getting an MLS franchise. Maybe you think he's in this for purely altruistic / sporting reasons, but I suspect not...
Posted by Stu on March 11, 2009 at 2:38 PM · Report
14
Wait, I thought you were the ones arguing he was in it for altruistic/sporting reasons?

In that situation wouldn't the City say: if you move the Beavers we won't allow you to update PGE Park, because we own it.
Posted by Blabby on March 11, 2009 at 2:50 PM · Report
15
Revised electeds scorecard:

Ted Wheeler +12
Nick Fish +12
Amanda Fritz +9
Sam Adams -11
Dan Saltzman -14
Randy Leonard -26
Posted by Euphonius on March 11, 2009 at 5:51 PM · Report

Add a comment

Our Friends

Our Enemies

/images/adoftheweek.gif

ad of the day

The Handyman Pro - Your Honey-Do Specialist
Don’t let our name fool you. The Handyman Pro, LLC is a repair and remodel service provider with over 25-years experience. We cover all aspects of construction and repairs for residential and commercial clients.go


post an ad

All contents © Index Newspapers, LLC

115 SW Ash St. Suite 600
Portland, OR 97204

Contact Info | Privacy Policy | Production Guidelines | Terms of Use