News On Tuesday, April 14, Mayor Sam Adams is hosting an "open house" with the public to discuss his quickly-developed plans to tear down Memorial Coliseum and build a minor-league baseball stadium in the Rose Quarter. With only days to go before City Council is expected to vote on the project on April 22, business owners from around the Rose Quarter already have questions for the mayor. "I am concerned ...   More

News As if the powers behind a new minor-league baseball stadium in the Rose Quarter and revamping PGE Park for Major League Soccer didn't have enough to worry about, now this longstanding concern about potty parity at stadiums has made it to the front page of today's New York Times. Fortunately, Portland already has its own commissioner concerned with all things potty. We're sure he's already on ...   More

News Mayor Sam Adams and Commissioner Randy Leonard may think tearing down Portland's 49-year-old Memorial Coliseum to make room for a new minor-league baseball stadium is a done deal. But a serious opposition has begun to coalesce. Writer Brian Libby has penned a sports-centric protest on his blog, Portland Architecture. Today the American Intsitute of Architects sent City Council a letter condemning ...   More

News Commissioner Randy Leonard went before the Lents Town Center Urban Renewal Area committee last night to tell the group the city wanted not $25 million from the tax-increment district, not $40 million, but $42 million. The new $2 million cost to taxpayers would be necessary, Leonard said, because the new baseball stadium Leonard and Mayor Sam Adams want to build in Lents would destroy a soccer ...   More

News An Oct. 26, 1960, article from the Oregon Journal reveals the Portland Beavers have considered moving to Lents before -- to a Southeast Portland farm site once owned by A.V. and Robertina Folkman. That farm site eventually became Eastport Plaza, the shopping center now on Southeast 82nd Avenue between Holgate and Powell boulevards. Jim Running, an Oregon Journal staff writer in 1960, writes: "With ...   More

News A few more details on the proposal to bring minor league baseball to Lents Park have emerged in recent days. As previously reported, the proposed stadium would "require" 1,500 parking spaces, some of which could be at nearby Marshall High School (with cash-strapped Portland Public Schools earning some money from the deal.) This weekend, former Portland Development Commission director Don ...   More

News The cafeteria of Lent Elementary School near the site of Merritt Paulson's proposed baseball stadium was crowded Wednesday night with Lents neighbors who had questions about the proposal and its funding as well as the stadium's possible impact on the Southeast Portland neighborhood. And, oh man, was it heated. Commissioner Randy Leonard was one of the first people to speak at the meeting convened ...   More

News The Foster-Powell Neighborhood Association, which overlaps the Lents Town Center Urban Renewal Area, has officially voiced its opposition [PDF] to Merritt Paulson's minor-league baseball stadium proposal. In the letter posted above, Erica Bjerning, chair of the Southeast Portland neighborhood association, writes: Residents were polled months ago on their opinion of having a lovely stadium in ...   More

News The push to build a minor-league baseball stadium in Lents got personal last week as team-owner Merritt Paulson's lobbyist, Greg Peden, tried to meet and speak individually with the 15 members of the Lents Town Center Urban Renewal Advisory Committee. The committee is the all-volunteer group that Commissioner Dan Saltzman, the swing vote on the impending deal, is looking to for guidance on whether ...   More

News The media-hungry folks at People For The Ethical Treatment of Animals often strike out on the "scorecard of good taste" when it comes to their appetite for attention. But here's at least a single's worth of news: Portland's PGE Park ranks third in PETA's lineup of America's top-10 vegetarian-friendly minor league ballparks. Turns out PGE Park scores well for its offerings of Gardenburgers, ...   More