Dundon has five years remaining on his lease in Portland.
If Tom Dundon is trying to win friends and influence people in Portland, Oregon by being inflexible in helping to pay a part of an arena renovation funding plan, he is failing. Dundon has just taken over the operations of the National Basketball Association’s Portland Trail Blazers franchise after buying the business for $4.25 billion. Dundon doesn’t plan to spend another nickel and doesn’t want to chip in to help pay for the renovation of the 31-year-old venue. It is estimated that it will cost $600 million to upgrade the building. Dundon has five years left on the lease to use the building that was signed by a previous owner. Oregon Governor Tina Kotek signed Senate Bill 1501, which approved $365 million in state-issued bonds to renovate the arena. But that doesn’t happen without the city of Portland and Multnomah County throwing in $235 million and Dundon signing a 20-year lease. Portland politicians are not sure how their share of the money will be found. Dundon said he has paid enough money in taxes as Portland is an expensive place to do business.
“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,” Dundon said. “I just know it feels like we’re making a pretty big investment by staying here and paying these tax rates and agreeing to these fees for dollars that go back into the building. It’s not that we’re taking the money.” Money is always the problem. Sports owners have a rare business and there are just 30 of these NBA businesses and an owner can always threaten a bunch of politicians with give us public money in some form for a venue or someone else in another town will give us that money. It’s how the arena game operates.
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