[PHOTO TEASE BY MARK WEBER]
Larry Miller and the Portland Trail Blazers are pulling in some outside help for their inside job partnering with The Cordish Company, a real estate development and entertainment operating company based in Maryland.

On Saturday night in the Georgia Pacific Room at Memorial Coliseum, Miller — the Blazers team president and JumpTown front man — gave a half-hour presentation to roughly 60 ticket package leaders on the Rose Quarter vision and repurposing Memorial Coliseum.

During the forum, those gathered heard early and often about The Cordish Company, which we’ll continue to hear more about if or when the Blazers' proposal is eventually accepted by Mayor Sam Adams and the Stakeholder Advisory Committee (SAC).

To date, Maryland-based Cordish includes 28 properties specializing in “entertainment and mixed-use, gaming and lodging, sports-anchored developments, retail, office and residential,” including Ball Park Village in St. Louis and Philly Live in Philadelphia, among others.

“So far, [Cordish has] been successful with every one of these projects — all are focused on the area and city they are in. They want it to connect with the community,” Miller said.

“The key for me and from our perspective is that it resonates with the people of Portland. Because at the end of the day, that’s what it really comes down to. That’s what is going to make it succeed or not succeed. This is being driven by us. It’s being driven by someone outside. We are all part of this city.”

Miller pointed to one Cordish development — KC Power & Light District in Kansas City — as an example for employment growth, saying 5,000 new jobs were added to that area as a result. Even still, Miller is aware there are skeptics (as Commissioner Randy Leonard described himself in an interview with the Sentinel last week), particularly in a public/private partnership like this one. That obviously won’t keep Miller and company from moving forward.

“There’s been talk about why this wouldn’t work. I listened to a radio show one day — and I won’t say who it was — but they were saying, ‘Oh, this won’t work.’ If we took that approach of nothing has happened, why would we try and make something happen? That is a self-fulfilling prophecy. We are taking the approach that this is the right time, we have the right partners, and that we have the right idea and right vision to make something happen. So we are going to continue to push forward with our vision for the Rose Quarter.”

The SAC extended the date to accept concept applications to January 8, 2010, leaving the Portland Trail Blazers — with the planning of Cordish — that much longer to polish their JumpTown proposal.