Yes to MLS

This past Saturday I had the opportunity to attend a rally at City Hall with over 300 Portlanders of all ages, ethnicities and political persuasions who were united in sending a common message to our City Council: Bring Major League Soccer to Portland. It was inspiring to see so many people united as a community looking to the future despite these uncertain times.

Yet too often throughout this debate, hysteria and hyperbole have replaced rational thought. The argument against this proposal has typically gone something like this:

“We have the highest unemployment in 10 years, a $3 billion shortfall in the next state budget, and our schools are underfunded and you want to invest $85 million dollars in taxpayer-backed bonds to remodel PGE Park into a world-class soccer stadium and build a separate baseball stadium for the Portland Beavers?”

Well, the answer is unequivocal: Yes.

In fact, it is exactly these conditions that make it critical that we move forward with this project. Now more than ever, we need to invest in people and publicly owned infrastructure (remember: PGE Park is owned by the city of Portland) in order to get this economy moving again. And this proposal would do just that.

– Excerpt from OregonLive.com, Guest Opinion by Jeremy Wright