Beaverton gets the ball rolling for Beavers’ baseball

The Beaverton City Council voted Monday night to spend nearly $100,000 to get the ball rolling to bring the Portland Beavers to town.

With a 4-0 vote and one abstaining, the Triple-A baseball team is one step closer to calling Beaverton home.

The issue at hand pending $90,000 in legal fees to explore whether Beaverton is a good fit for a minor league baseball stadium.

One of the sites under consideration is the old Westgate Theater lot along Cedar Hills Boulevard.

The city wants to hire local firm Ball Janik, as well as the Chicago-based firm, DLA Piper to conduct due diligence.

“We’re going with the best that we can find in the country,” Mayor Denny Doyle said. “This is important that we do it right and they’re very experienced, they’ve done a lot of stadium deals in the U.S.”

Doyle says the $90,000 will come from Beaverton’s general fund contingency account, which is $14 million. Doyle says the city has received mostly positive feedback from the community.

– Excerpt from KGW.com, August 4, 2009