Major League Baseball Investors Have Offered Portland Public Schools $80 Million for Lloyd District Site

The baseball group is offering to buy the old headquarters valued at more than $100 million. Will offer another location.

Oakland A's at Baltimore Orioles June 6, 2011 (_MG_9849 / Flickr)

The group trying to bring a Major League Baseball to Portland is offering Portland Public Schools $80 million for their main administration building in the Lloyd District, as a site for a baseball stadium.

Oregonian sports columnist John Canzano announced that price on Twitter last night. A source close to the negotiations has confirmed the figure to WW. 

Update, 3 pm: WW has obtained a copy of the $80 million bid via a public records request. You can read it here.

The PPS site is worth more than $100 million, according to a Multnomah County assessment. But WW has learned the offer from the baseball group, called the Portland Diamond Project, will include other sweeteners. That includes a property swap that would give PPS the Banfield Animal Hospital site on Northeast 82nd Avenue, a source close to the deal told WW.

The PPS property is one of two sites the group made formal offers on, WW reported Tuesday.

Related: The Backers of Bringing Major League Baseball to Portland Have Placed Bids on Two Potential Stadium Sites—One on Each Side of the Willamette River

PPS previously owned the Banfield Animal Hospital Site, and the location could serve as a new administrative headquarters. But 82nd Avenue may be considered less than hospitable by district officials who serve schools on both the east and west side.

The Portland Diamond Project hopes to lure the Oakland A's to Portland or score an expansion franchise. But it faces an uphill battle to bring a team to the city.

Mayor Ted Wheeler has yet to show interest in the project. And the team will also face competition for the PPS site.

Albina Vision, a group chaired by Rukaiyah Adams that is seeking to build affordable housing in the Rose Quarter, objects to locating the stadium at the PPS site.

Portland Public Schools board member Paul Anthony declined to discuss details of the offer with WW. But he said the district isn't for or against the offer at this point, and instead intends to take "a calm, cold, clear-eyed view of the costs and potential benefits" of the offer.

There's no word yet on details of the offer on the ESCO site in Northwest, which is the other possible stadium location.

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