Dundon: Taxpayers Should Foot the Bill for Portland Arena Makeover

The battle lines are rapidly hardening in the Portland arena renovation funding right, and the message from Trail Blazers owner Tom Dundon is stark and clear: Don’t expect me to help pay for it.

A day after Portland Mayor Keith Wilson publicly pleaded with the city council to approve up to $120 million in municipal funding to renovate the Moda Center, Dundon appeared at a Portland Metro Chamber event late Wednesday and said private financing is not part of his vision to upgrade the 31-year-old, publicly owned venue.

“It feels like we’re making a pretty big investment by staying here and paying these tax rates,” Dundon said at the event, which the business group held at the Moda Center. 

While not a specific and overt threat to leave town if the renovation funding bill fails, Dundon did little at the session to dismiss existing fears that he would do so. 

“I think everybody can characterize things however they want. I don’t see it the same way, but I’m not trying to get people to agree or disagree with me,” he said. 

More specifically, Dundon also argued he’s still contributing indirectly to the renovation funding by passing along ticket taxes that are part of the proposed structure.

“When you charge an incremental fee on the ticket, we’re really just paying it,” Dundon said. “So we are investing [in the renovation] because if you didn’t charge that money on the ticket, we would charge more for the ticket. Supply and demand works pretty well. And, obviously, there’s lots of places that don’t have taxes at the same rate.”

Other Side of the Table

As Dundon made his remarks, several members of Portland’s 12-member city council remained strongly opposed to providing funding. The city’s share of a nearly $600 million arena renovation project would add to up to $365 million in Oregon state funds and $88 million in Multnomah County money that already have been approved. The pathway for the city approval, however, is increasingly uncertain. 

“I am going to have a hard time agreeing to give public money if I’m not seeing a private investment,” said city councilor Candace Avalos.

Added fellow councilor Angelita Morillo: “The options on the table here, at least from the limited information that I have been given, are shaky at best and fiscally irresponsible at worst. And it seems absurd to tout this as a good deal.”

The expanding political divide between Dundon and many Portland leaders adds to what has been a turbulent start to the owner’s tenure there since acquiring the NBA team earlier this year in a $4.25 billion deal. Already, Dundon has implemented widespread staff cuts within the team. 

Elsewhere in Dundon’s sports portfolio, though, he’s now a Stanley Cup champion with the Hurricanes and continues to draw praise from NHL commissioner Gary Bettman. 

Dundon, meanwhile, pushed back against a growing incidence of team tanking in the NBA, something that led league commissioner Adam Silver to impose more stringent penalties.

“What I don’t think we’ll have [with the Blazers] is sort of what they went through for a few years where, sounds terrible, they were trying to lose a little bit,” he said. “I’m not doing that. We’ll try to win.”