Skip to main content
Back in 2009, the future of Major League Soccer in Portland hung by a single vote.
To bring the Portland Timbers into MLS, soccer honcho Merritt Paulson needed to upgrade their stadium, then known as PGE Park, owned by the city of Portland. He asked the city to pitch in $40 million for the upgrade. City commissioners balked. The city’s budget had been hammered by the Great Recession.
Then a ragtag band of soccer hooligans took over.
The Timbers Army was born in the early 2000s, when the team was in the minor leagues and it seemed if anyone were going to the majors in Portland, it would be baseball. But the Army, a group of soccer nuts congregating in Section 107, channeled the city’s identity in a way that Portlandia could only imitate. “It’s part Europhilia, part Latin American rhythm and part subcultural strangeness that’s pure Portland,” WW wrote in 2005.
The MLS deal had plenty of critics. (This newspaper was among them, splashing “Kill This Deal” across its cover.) When it came up for vote in 2009, the council was split. Mayor Sam Adams and Commissioner Randy Leonard backed the idea. Commissioners Amanda Fritz and Nick Fish were against. The deciding vote lay with Commissioner Dan Saltzman.
The day of the vote, the Army packed council chambers to capacity. They testified—and chanted. “Dan Saltzman, who was the tie-breaking vote on council that day, said it was the Timbers Army that swayed him,” recalls capo Shawn Levy.
Saltzman voted for the deal, and the rest is history. The Timbers went on to win the MLS Cup in 2015, and the Army now boasts more than 5,000 fans whose notorious cheers shake Providence Park. The success of MLS paved the way for the Portland Thorns and their supporters, the Rose City Riveters.
Today, Levy sits on the board of one of the Army’s nonprofit arms, building soccer pitches for kids in underserved areas of the city. “Someday,” he says, “some boy or girl who grew up playing on one of those courts is going to score an unforgettable goal at our stadium.”
Next Story > 2010: Saving the Hollywood Theatre
Opens in new window