The Multnomah Greyhound Park in Wood Village, Oregon will be demolished by its new owners, the Confederated Tribes of the Grand Ronde. A farewell party was held for the facility last week, attended by about 100 people.
The park has been vacant since 2004. The city of Wood Village, Oregon will be collaborating with the tribes on what to do with the property. Although several possible futures are being examined, the most popular appears to be retail shopping, according to a spokesman for the project. There are no plans to apply to put the land into trust.
The tribes own the Spirit Mountain Casino, and they say that whatever is done with the property will be done with an eye towards adding value to the casino and vice versa.
Grand Ronde Tribal Council member Reynold Leno told the Columbian, “We hope we tie something in here that we can benefit Spirit Mountain with. You come here, you shop, you get points or something, or you go to Spirit Mountain and you can come here and get benefits.” He added, “That’s kind of the idea of what we want to do. We’re not going to kill our own casino.”
Wood Village Mayor Patricia Smith added, “I know that this is just going to be something that’s going to benefit both city and tribe. The quality of this development on this site will really define Wood Village.”
The soon-to-be demolished racetrack opened in 1957 and had its best year 30 years later when over 611,000 people attended. Then a slow decline began.
