The battle between the City of Portland and the Portland Trail Blazers franchise over renovation of Portland’s Moda Center arena has taken center stage in July of 2026. Representatives of the city and the Blazers have been sniping back and forth in the local media, each accusing the other of being obstinate, recalcitrant, or out of touch.
Separating wheat from chaff is always difficult in these situations, but here are a couple of updates that have been published in the last 24 hours.
The first comes
from The Oregonian’s Bill Oram, a loudly-braying voice in the midst of the fracas. He published an article citing an anonymous team source eviscerating the city and its proposed offer of a 20-year lease with labor agreements and property tax offsets. The biggest revelation in Oram’s piece is a new declaration that the team may “toss aside” the entire deal, including the $365 million promised from Oregon’s state government.
The team’s new board of directors, composed of controlling owner Tom Dundon and at least four co-owners, was scheduled to meet Monday afternoon. The official said one “very real” potential outcome of that meeting could be the ownership group resetting the negotiations and starting over, including tossing aside the $365 million commitment the state made earlier this year.
The official noted that the Trail Blazers ranked last in the NBA in sponsorships last season and were the only team in the league not to secure a jersey patch sponsor, issues that point to economic realities that the ownership group underestimated.
Citing that view of the city’s business climate and rising construction costs, the official added, “The deal doesn’t get better. It gets worse with time.”
Oram suggests that the provisions for unionized labor and partnering with agencies in the Albina neighborhood, where the arena is located, are particularly onerous for the Blazers. He quotes the team source saying, “Why is the city sending this thing knowing that we’re not going to agree to it?”
That was followed by an even more strident proclamation, after the source accused the city of complicating the deal and the process: “The city of Portland doesn’t even recognize that they got a sweetheart deal,” the source claims, “And if they want to say no, if they don’t want us, then that’s fine.”
Lastly, and clearly, the team official told Oram that the cost of relocating the Blazers could easily be offset by increased valuation of the franchise in a new location.
Meanwhile long-time Portland media member John Canzano quoted an anonymous source on the city side of the negotiations, indicating that the Blazers have not responded to the city’s offer sheet and that, in effect, talks are stalled until they do:
Source involved with Trail Blazers negotiation at City Hall tells me Tom Dundon’s group has not responded to the term sheet.
Asked if the city would alter the term sheet without talking w Dundon: “We’d be negotiating against ourselves, and that’s never a good idea.”
Blazers fans can buckle up and double down on the antacid. The story appears to be getting uglier by the day. Stay tuned.
