A Minor League Baseball team in Oregon is receiving millions of dollars from the state to go toward a new stadium, keeping the team from relocating away from the Portland metropolitan area.
The Oregon Legislature approved $15 million in funding for a new Hillsboro Hops stadium, Oregon Public Broadcasting reported Saturday.
The House and Senate approved the legislation Thursday to help the team build a new baseball stadium for the Hops right next to Ron Tonkin Field, where the team plays. The Hops are a High-A affiliate, the third highest level of minor league baseball, for the Arizona Diamondbacks.
Major League Baseball had extended the Hops’ deadline to secure the funding for a new park from September 2023 to March 15, so the Hops managed to meet that requirement with only a few days to spare.
That $15 million was the final effort in what’s been a two-year plan for the Hops to finance the estimated $120 million needed for a new stadium.
Team president K.L. Wombacher told OPB that the team had exhausted all other private and public funding options; had the Legislature not decided to allocate the Hops $15 million, the team could have been relocated or ceased to exist altogether.
The team is contributing $82 million, the vast majority of which comes in the form of revenue bonds backed by the revenue expected to be generated by the new stadium, Wombacher said, a risky investment since minor league baseball is a small-margin industry.
Construction on the new stadium will likely begin this summer, the team announced, with the first games at the new ballpark taking place in 2026. The city of Hillsboro will continue to operate and maintain ownership of Ron Tonkin Field.
During testimony at the Legislature, Hops team officials said that the city losing the team would cost the state millions of dollars in income tax generated from Hops employees, and the region would have lost a massive gathering place.
“We’re basically forgoing profit to finance the stadium with that $80 million,” Wombacher said, as reported by OPB. “It’s a massive risk, that’s for sure, to finance that large of an amount. I don’t know that it’s been done in the minor leagues before.”
The Hops also received $18 million from the city of Hillsboro in future lodging taxes, $8 million from Washington County, and $2 million from Explore Tualatin Valley, a local nonprofit that promotes tourism in the region.
