Updated: 4:48 pm July 17
The city of Portland delivered the first draft of a term sheet to the Trail Blazers management on Thursday, July 16, setting the city one step closer to a long-term lease agreement with the team for the Moda Center.
No terms have been finalized, and the Council is in disagreement about many of the details, including what the city’s share of public investment should be in an upcoming renovation of the arena. The draft term sheet indicates the city may contribute “an amount not to exceed” $120 million for eligible renovation expenses. The draft terms also include a stipulation that the Blazers will stay in Portland for at least 20 years, and play all home games at the Moda Center. The city is also requesting a $3 million annual payment from Rip City Management—the team’s management group that handles events at the Moda Center—to make up for a loss of property tax revenue the site no longer generates because it’s now a city-owned property as of 2024. That annual amount would increase over time, with the proceeds going to the city, county, and Portland Public Schools.
Other requests included in the terms are fan perks and conveniences like ensuring all tickets to Rose Quarter events can be used as round-trip fare on TriMet buses and trains.
“The City has produced a term sheet that is reasonable, fair, and focused on keeping the Trail Blazers in Portland, ensuring the long‑term viability of the City‑owned arena, and delivering meaningful community benefits,” a city news release states.
Councilors were shown a presentation regarding proposed terms during a closed-door executive session meeting with the mayor, city administration, and contracted negotiators Thursday, but no term sheet was finalized or approved by Council. That would require a vote outside of an executive session meeting. Council President Jamie Dunphy scheduled a follow-up session where some said they had expected to go over the terms in more detail before sending anything over to the Blazers.
But instead, the terms were presented to the Blazers shortly after Thursday’s meeting, catching many councilors off guard. The draft term sheet was released to the public on Friday, July 17.
The city’s public release comes just days after NBA Commissioner Adam Silver said he felt Portland’s talks with the Blazers had gotten off track, amid a looming threat from Blazers owner Tom Dundon to move the team if the city doesn’t cave to his demands for a publicly-funded arena remodel.
As previously reported by the Mercury, the city also wants to see labor peace agreements in place for the Moda Center’s workforce. Peace agreements, or neutrality agreements, are contracts between employers and workers that ensure there won’t be disruptions or interference if employees unionize. Most employees at the Moda Center aren’t unionized.
Among the terms the city is hoping to include in a 20-year lease agreement is a stipulation that the team management will be responsible for footing the cost of any overruns on renovations to the Moda Center that Dundon has insisted be paid for entirely by the public.
The scale and scope of that renovation—previously estimated to cost nearly $600 million initially, but likely much more after years of interest payments from financing—has yet to be ironed out.
“The current term sheet seems to imply that the City will be happy if the only financial commitment the Blazers make is to pay that $3 million a year—of which the city would only get a fraction. That’s not a fair deal.”
City Councilor Steve Novick, District 3
It’s unclear exactly how much the city will contribute toward the renovation, but the prevailing expectation is that the city should expect to chip in about $120 million, as listed in the draft terms. The Oregon State Legislature has already committed $365 million and Multnomah County has already pledged $88 million.
Not all city councilors are happy about that figure, though. Some said Thursday they felt the mayor and state officials had jumped the gun by pre-committing the city without consulting the full Council.
“The mayor had no authority to authorize any kind of amount. We still don’t know where that amount even came from,” District 1 Councilor Candace Avalos told the Mercury Thursday. “That’s the issue, why councilors are feeling frustrated is because we’re the budget authority and we’re the ones that are supposed to make the ultimate decision, but we’re brought in at the last minute and expected to go along with things that were predetermined that the mayor decided.”
Avalos said she’s unclear how the mayor or other negotiators working for the city arrived at the $120 million figure.
In District 3, Councilor Steve Novick isn’t thrilled about the draft terms the city shared, either. Novick said he wants to see the city recoup any investments it makes into the Moda Center, which the city took ownership of in 2024.
“The draft term sheet doesn’t reflect my preferred deal, which would be one that mimics what the state is getting. The amount they’re giving is equal to the amount they expect to get back through the income taxes on player salaries, which they wouldn’t get if the Blazers left. They’ll come out even,” Novick told the Mercury. “The current term sheet seems to imply that the City will be happy if the only financial commitment the Blazers make is to pay that $3 million a year—of which the city would only get a fraction. That’s not a fair deal.”
Novick said he fears the Blazers will interpret the draft term sheet as the city’s opening offer, even though it’s a draft that wasn’t approved by Council. He said he’d like to see the city take a bigger percentage of revenue from things like parking fees and ticket sales at the Moda Center, or at the very least, see in concrete terms, what the team’s community investments are.
“I think the Blazers are likely to think that this is the most we will ever ask for, and they can negotiate us down from there,” he added.
In District 4, Green is lobbying for more time to make funding decisions about the Moda Center renovations on behalf of taxpayers. Currently, the city is expected to have its terms finalized by August 12.
“My biggest takeaway is everything seems to be about this timeline, that we’re up against the clock… and I just want to challenge that, because we have four years left in a lease and pretty strong contract protections, and just because the mayor and other parties put us into a situation where we’re on this short timeline on numbers that are plucked out of nowhere, that’s not my problem,” Green told the Mercury.
Like most of his colleagues, the councilor said he’s determined to “fight for a deal that Portlanders can feel good about.”
Right now, that fight might be against top officials at City Hall, who’ve all but backed the city into a corner to cough up $120 million toward arena improvements.
“I think I’m open to some level of public investment, no question,” Green clarified. “I just want that number to be grounded in what we actually need to do to have that asset to be maintained where we do get back the kind of Novick-style ‘pay ourselves back over time’ concept that makes sense to me, but it could be at a much lower project cost.”
Green said if the project cost comes down, then it leaves room for the team’s owner, Dundon, to consider investing in other things nearby.
The council is expected to hold another executive session to discuss Moda Center terms next week.
