Bears Want New Chicago Stadium, Pritzker Says Public Funds Limited

After considering a move to the Chicago suburb of Arlington Heights, the Bears announced plans this week for a new publicly owned domed stadium on Chicago’s lakefront.

The NFL franchise is offering to spend more than $2B to cover part of the cost for a new stadium—which could end up costing twice as much as the Bears’ contribution—to be built just south of 100-year-old Soldier Field, most of which would be demolished under the plan.

The Bears’ plan for a new publicly owned venue comes on the heels of a proposal from the Chicago White Sox to build a new MLB ballpark on the South Side that would become the centerpiece of Related’s $7B mixed-use development known as The 78.

White Sox owner Jerry Reinsdorf pitched the project to state legislators last month, reportedly asking for as much as $1B in public funding for the new baseball stadium. The two massive sports venue projects are setting up a national test of the limits of public financing for new sports palaces for privately owned teams worth billions of dollars.

Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker has signaled that there is a limit to how much the state will contribute to these projects. Leaders in the state legislature have instructed the Bears and White Sox to come up will a joint proposal regarding public funding for their new stadiums, according to a report from a local NBC affiliate.

Pritzker has cost doubt about the appetite for much public funding for either project, the report said.

“Stadium projects around the country have occurred with public dollars—fewer and fewer over the years and there’s a reason for that,” Pritzker said.

“The return on investment for taxpayers has to be proven now before we would actually move forward. I have not seen proof that this is a good deal for the taxpayers of the state of Illinois, but they have not presented that case yet,” the governor added.

According to a report in the Sun-Times, Related Midwest, which is developing the 62-acre South Loop project that will feature the new White Sox ballpark, is exploring the possibility of creating a “financing partnership” with the Bears to enable both stadium projects to move forward at the same time.

Complicating the effort of both teams to persuade the state to spend hundreds of millions on new sports palaces is the fact that a significant amount of money is still owed on Soldier Field, which was renovated in 2002, and on the Guaranteed Rate ballpark built in 1991 as the home of the White Sox.

The Illinois Sports Facility Authority, which issued bonds for the construction on both stadiums, owes $589M on the Soldier Field renovation and $50M for the MLB ballpark. The bonds are paid in part by the state’s 2% hotel tax; if that revenue is not sufficient, Chicago’s share of the state income tax will pick up the shortfall.

Prior to shifting its stadium plans to the lakefront, the Bears were planning to build a multi-billion stadium district in Arlington Heights at a site that formerly housed the Arlington International Racecourse.

The plan for the lakefront stadium already is generating pushback from historic preservation groups who want to prevent the demolition of most of Soldier Field, which was delisted as a National Historic Landmark during the 2002 renovation but remains on the National Register of Historic Places.

Although plans for a new stadium will preserve Soldier Field’s signature colonnades, a group called Landmarks Illinois wants to save the century-old stadium. Friends of the Park, a group that successfully blocked Star Wars creator George Lucas’ plan to build a museum on the site designated for the new Bears venue, also is opposing the stadium plan.