Mayor Brandon Johnson on Tuesday mounted the legislative equivalent of a goal line stand against the Bears’ quest for the property tax break needed to pave the way for a domed stadium in Arlington Heights.
Johnson questioned why any lawmaker from Chicago would even think about providing a massive tax break for a professional sports team valued at nearly $9 billion, while ignoring the need for what he calls progressive revenue to increase school funding and help working people struggling to make ends meet.
“If we’re asking anyone to tighten the belt, we should look at whose belt is exploding — and that’s the ultra-rich. As their bellies get fat and our people are starving, this is not the time to balance the budget off the backs of working people,” the mayor said at his weekly news conference.
“The type of tax structure that they would set up for large corporations and billionaires without a clear pathway to provide certainty as well as equity for everyday working people, I believe that’s a mismatch there. And quite frankly, the infrastructure they’re even discussing in the suburbs — those infrastructure needs have been present on the lakefront for a very long time.”
Hours before joining fellow Chicago area mayors in Springfield, where he has had little success, Johnson made it clear that he would use whatever political muscle he has to block the so-called megaprojects bill now before the Illinois Senate after clearing the Illinois House April 22.
Though Chicago is no longer part of the conversation to build a domed stadium needed to keep the Bears in Illinois and stave off a move to Northwest Indiana, Johnson is still holding out hope to keep the Bears in the city.
“I’m building things in this city. I want to build more things in this city. Why is that important? Because it creates opportunities for Chicagoans,” Johnson said. “Why would I advocate for something that wouldn’t benefit the people of Chicago? I don’t know why any Chicago legislator would vote for anything that doesn’t benefit the people that they represent.”
Black contractors need opportunities provided by new construction projects after historically being “shut out,” Johnson said.
“Arlington Heights? Anywhere else? A Chicagoan having to commute two hours out of their way for a job? That is not something that … anybody who represents Chicago should want,“ Johnson said. “At a time in which property values are increasing and affordability is becoming that much more of a challenge, to do anything in favor of entities with means without supporting families who have needs — I would find that shortsighted.”
State Rep. Kam Buckner, D-Chicago, countered that the megaprojects bill he stewarded through through the Illinois House with support from 33 members of the Chicago delegation is “replete with tools that help Chicago compete and bring in large-scale developments.”
“We do it in a way that’s smart and benefits residents,” Buckner told the Chicago Sun-Times. “There are minority contracting requirements in there. There is property tax relief in there for the people of Chicago. There’s jobs. There’s investment. There’s real pathways. Focusing on Arlington Heights is missing the broader conversation about what is in this bill.”
A “vast majority” of the Chicago delegation “understood that, and you can tell it by the vote,” Buckner said.
Two years ago, Johnson joined Bears president Kevin Warren in unveiling plans for a domed lakefront stadium adjacent to Soldier Field that would have required $2.4 billion in public support.
Gov. JB Pritzker and Democratic legislative leaders were conspicuously absent. The mayor’s plan went nowhere in Springfield.
On Tuesday, Johnson said he has other stadium sites and ideas to keep the Bears in Chicago.
He refused to reveal specifics. Alternatives include: The 78, site of the new Chicago Fire stadium under construction; the Amtrak site near The 78 eyed by the White Sox for a new ballpark; the stalled One Central megaproject on railyard land near Soldier Field, or the 49-acre Michael Reese Hospital site that the Bears have rejected as too narrow.
Chicago Park District Supt. Carlos Ramirez-Rosa is preparing for life without the Bears by continuing to lobby for $630 million to renovate Soldier Field and ease the traffic bottleneck that makes it difficult to get in and out of the Museum Campus.
But Johnson is not giving up hope, even though Arlington Heights and Hammond, Indiana, were the only Bears stadium sites discussed with NFL owners recently.
On Tuesday, Johnson said he and Ramirez-Rosa agree on the need to improve lakefront access.
“The campus needs a makeover,” Johnson said. “The ingress-egress is absolutely horrific. I don’t mean to trigger Bears fans or concertgoers. [But] it is just brutal getting in and out of that space. … It disrupts the type of flow that would naturally carry over to the rest of the campus,” Johnson said.