MOORE’S SUMMARY: With just 10 days before state lawmakers wrap up their spring session, there’s “substantial opposition” to megaprojects legislation that would ostensibly clear the path for the Chicago Bears to build a new domed stadium in Arlington Heights, a top negotiator told Capitol News Illinois.
“We’re trying to work through those things, but they’re not small obstacles,” said state Sen. Bill Cunningham, D-Chicago, who’s handling negotiations in the upper chamber.
THREE THINGS: Cunningham said there are three major obstacles to a Bears deal.
- Opposition from Chicago-based lawmakers “has intensified” after word leaked of a meeting between the Bears and the city of Chicago last month, as was first reported by the Chicago Tribune. In that meeting, the team allegedly expressed a willingness to reconsider the lakefront if the Arlington Heights site falls fails. Cunningham said “that outreach has helped breathe life” into Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson’s Hail Mary effort to keep the team in city limits.
Bears spokesman Scott Hagel told Capitol News Illinois that the meetings “were limited to counsel‑to‑counsel engagement” related to the team’s tenancy at Soldier Field and there were “no conversations with team management.”
“Consistent with long-standing practice, these discussions covered a variety of topics and will remain confidential,” Hagel said. “No substantive changes resulted. There are only two sites under consideration, Arlington Heights and Hammond.”
Still, Johnson is fighting to keep the team in Chicago, urging state lawmakers to kill any megaprojects bill that would facilitate a move.
2. The Bears still haven’t submitted a traffic study for the Arlington Heights site, which they’ve owned for more than three years. While Gov. JB Pritzker and state lawmakers have generally expressed support for infrastructure spending to support the development, a study is necessary to understand what is actually needed. Cunningham said the team has indicated they’re “still several weeks away” from completing the study.
“The state can’t appropriate funds without that study,” Cunningham said. “It’s a basic ingredient for planning a large development, and we don’t have it, despite the planning for Arlington Heights going on for maybe three years now.”
The megaprojects bill and infrastructure spending are technically separate buckets, but the absence of a traffic study is causing some issues with surrounding communities and perhaps lessening support for the megaprojects bill among suburban lawmakers.
- There’s continued discomfort among some legislators with the payment in lieu of taxes mechanism. “They just have questions about what the size of the payment would be and what the potential impact might be on surrounding communities,” Cunningham said.
STEP UP: With those obstacles, Cunningham said “the Bears need to step up their game.”
“It’s ultimately up to them to secure 30 votes in the Senate (and) 60 votes in the House,” Cunningham said. “I think that they need to be more focused on that.”
WHY IT MATTERS: The Bears say that legislation allowing the team to negotiate and lock in a lower property tax payment with surrounding taxing bodies for up to four decades, is a prerequisite for building on the 326-acre site they own in the northwest suburbs. If they don’t pass it, the organization has threatened to leave for a site in Hammond, Indiana. Hoosier lawmakers have promised a $1 billion public subsidy for stadium construction.
STATE OF PLAY: Despite the obstacles, Statehouse sources believe it is still more likely than not that a megaprojects bill gets across the finish line before lawmakers wrap up their business May 31.
Simply put, no one wants to be blamed for allowing the Bears to leave the state. Without a megaprojects bill, there’s a belief that the team will take the deal in Indiana.
The House passed a version of the bill 78-32 in April, with 10 Republicans in support. It was viewed as a flawed product, but it settled the concern that the bill couldn’t clear the House Democrats’ 60-vote rule. Pritzker has been publicly supportive throughout the session. So the ball’s now in the Senate’s court.
A Statehouse source told us that the state’s powerful trade unions have started to get more heavily involved in lobbying lawmakers to support the megaprojects legislation, which could potentially unlock billions of dollars’ worth of projects and create thousands of construction jobs across the state.
What will the final product look like? Cunningham said they “haven’t exactly landed on a plan.” But there remains a desire to provide property tax relief for residents in any package.
The House version would siphon half of the payment in lieu of taxes for property tax rebates. But a report from Pritzker’s office shows that relief under that plan would likely be miniscule. And the Bears have told lawmakers that “with that mechanic in place, they would likely not build in Arlington Heights,” Cunningham said. As a result, lawmakers have been searching for an alternative that can provide more substantive property tax relief while not undercutting the goal of the megaproject tool.
Beyond that, there will likely be sweeteners for Chicago. The Chicago Park District is likely to receive some state infrastructure funds to renovate Soldier Field in anticipation of a post-Bears future. The megaprojects bill may also include mechanisms to help spur economic development projects in the city, such the One Central project near McCormick Place.
JOHNSON’S HEAVE: Muddying the waters is Johnson’s Hail Mary heave to keep the team. In addition to lobbying lawmakers the mayor last week proposed a city takeover of the Illinois Sports Facilities Authority, the government entity created to construct Rate Field and, later, renovate Soldier Field. Soldier Field.
Pritzker dismissed it as “typical” of Johnson’s late-in-the-game advocacy in the Capitol in recent years while accusing him of having “no plan” to keep the Bears in the city.
Johnson, in an interview on WVON radio on Tuesday, said the “disconnect” between himself and Pritzker stems from their different upbringings. He argued that Pritzker, a billionaire, could not relate to the struggles of working class people in the same way he could.
“I’m not a billionaire. I’m not the heir of billions of dollars. I’m a working-class brother that was teaching middle school a handful of years ago,” Johnson said. “And so my motivation to make sure that a corporation keeps jobs in Chicago is so that families don’t have to struggle like my family did. And so, yes, that’s going to come across as a little more provocative, because what’s at stake for him is — it’s not the same as what’s at stake for me.”
Pritzker, responding at an unrelated event in Litchfield on Wednesday, said the difference was about values.
“Do we want to spend $2.5 billion of taxpayer dollars on the Chicago Bears, or do we want to spend a lot less than that in order to keep the Chicago Bears in Illinois?” Pritzker said, referring to the long-dismissed proposal for a lakefront stadium that’d require at least $900 million in public subsidies for direct stadium construction and $1.5 billion for infrastructure.
“So my response is: I think it’s about your values, it’s about what you really care about in life, and who you focused on, and I’ve focused on the working class, the middle class, and people most vulnerable throughout my career, and I think people across Illinois know that,” Pritzker said.
The governor also confirmed he had a “short” conversation with NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell earlier this week — one of several conversations the pair have had over the past few months, per his calendar. He said Goodell reiterated the Bears’ publicly stated position that their new stadium will be either in Arlington Heights or Hammond.
“I’m hopeful that the people who want to tank the bill are not successful,” Pritzker said.
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