The Hillsboro City Council is expected to vote tonight on a revised mitigation plan that would trigger a $25 million redevelopment of the Washington County Fairgrounds Sports Complex, effectively replacing community ballfields lost to the new Hillsboro Hops stadium project. These 4 fields will be the replacement fields.
The proposal comes after the Bonneville Power Administration (BPA) denied the City’s original plan to construct replacement fields at the Gordon Faber Recreation Complex (GFRC) due to powerline easement restrictions. Fields 4,5, and 6 at the Gordon Faber Recreational Facility were destroyed to make way for the new Hillsboro Hops stadium. The promise and hope were that replacement fields would be in place by the time the new stadium opened, but that was not the reality. Traditional baseball and softball tournaments that had been held at GFRC were moved to other cities, costing the City millions in lost revenue, and youth and adult leagues have had to scramble to find fieldspace.
The Shift to the Fairgrounds
Under the new recommendation from the Hillsboro Parks and Recreation Commission (PRC), the City will pivot from GFRC to the Fairgrounds site. The plan involves a long-term partnership with Washington County, which signaled its support for a lease agreement during a Board of Commissioners meeting on October 21, 2025.
If approved tonight, the City Manager will be authorized to execute a 20-year lease for the “West Fields” and a new North Parking Lot, along with a year-to-year lease for the “East Fields.”
Project Scope and Enhancements
The $25 million project aims to exceed the recreational capacity of the three fields (Fields 4, 5, and 6) currently being displaced at GFRC. Key components of the redevelopment include:
- Four New Youth Fields: Construction of four softball/baseball fields featuring artificial turf and LED lighting to allow for year-round use.
- Multi-Sport Integration: Outfields will be designed to accommodate soccer and other field sports, a move staff says will increase total community use hours.
- Infrastructure Upgrades: The plan includes new restrooms, improved drainage for the remaining natural grass fields, and a new parking lot on the north side of the road.
- Accessibility: The site’s proximity to the TriMet MAX line is cited as a primary equity benefit, providing better transit access than the previous GFRC alternative.
Funding and Budget
The project is funded through a combination of sources already integrated into the 2025-2027 Biennial City Budget.
Approximately $20 million is slated to be recouped through an annual ticket surcharge paid by the Hillsboro Hops over the life of their agreement with the City. The remaining $5 million will be covered by Park System Development Charges (SDCs), justified by the expansion of the facility’s capacity. The City intends to borrow the upfront costs through previously approved debt issuance.
Fairgrounds Partnership
The agreement includes specific provisions to support Washington County operations. The City will be responsible for maintaining the grounds and mitigating any wetlands impacted by construction. Additionally, the City must ensure that the new North Parking Lot can accommodate livestock biohazards and large-trailer storage during the annual Washington County Fair.
Council is also being asked to acknowledge the completion of the first phase of mitigation, which included securing 350 hours of community use at the new Hops Ballpark and upgrades to the existing Hillsboro Ballpark.
We expect this plan to be heartily adopted tonight.
The arrogance continues! I know, I know, if the taxpayers/voters of Hillsboro were allowed to vote on this, if defeated they’d build it anyway! This project, while worthy, deserves CITIZEN approval and not by Beach Pace and her put upon followers on the council. Pace gets whatever the hell she wants because she’s a somewhat of a bully.
The complete lack of public input at any step of this process—from the funding of the newest minor-league ballpark, to the demolition of the fields, to the siting and funding of new facilities—has been galling. But it’s an extension of the city and county land-use discussion that’s belied other topics on this site: Hillsboro and Washington County planning has occurred all too often without the input of those directly affected.
While I, for one, think that recovering the softball fields and creating a centralized, easily accessed location for youth sports is a sound idea, the Hillsboro pages contained input from people who preferred to see those sites used for soccer, pickleball, and tennis (though courts for the latter went largely unused for years). It was also noted that the area being considered for the fields also contained temporary housing sites established during the pandemic.
I still like this idea, but do not believe that fast tracking it in the same fashion as the new ballpark, its funding, or many of the North Hillsboro land-use decisions within the last decade are ultimately in the best interests of a cohesive city. At times, I’m not sure that a cohesive city is actually the goal here.
It’s difficult to lay blame at the feet of any one politician when the county keeps recycling names and tossing them into the election cycle. There is no reason to expect a different result when the folks who were in charge for the initial decisions and with their names on (or soon to be applied to) the facilities are still in their seats?
You can bet the ranch that Steve Callaway will have his F’in name branded somewhere at the new ball park which I wouldn’t walk across the street to attend. It’s gonna be a hoot to see how long the Hops stay afloat financially without a bailout, shhhhh, from the City, County, or State.
They’ve all got a stake in the unneeded edifice.
Why do they need to build a “NEW” Park?
The existing park has 5 softball fields already!
Plus there are already 2 fields for soccer.
One of the baseball diamonds they just let it go to pot and don’t even use, because they didn’t want to fix it up..
They had Tennis Courts that they shut down and didn’t want to keep it up..
Besides, that park only gets used for what, 4 maybe 5 months tops? Out of the year.
The youth softball league never had a problem with it.
And they also want to get rid of a lot of parking spaces also?
If you look at the map for the new park design, it eliminated a lot of the parking spots.
So why would you spend all this tax payer money on building a New park when you can just make improvements to the existing park?
And it would cost the tax payers a whole lot less!
I believe that the REAL reason behind the new design, is to eliminate the the field that the public uses to park for free and the parking lot they park in free during fireworks and events at the Fairgrounds and the Wingspan event building!
They want to FORCE the public to use their Pay for parking lot!
And they want to eliminate another area that the homeless RV’s use during the day!
Not all people who live in their RV are bad people.
You can tell the good ones by their current tags and ownership of their RV’s.
Plus. They are not run down.
But you know that it doesn’t matter what the general public has to say, the Mayor and City Council will do what they want!
We need to get rid of all of them and get regular citizens in those offices who ACTUALLY look out for our interests and not theirs!