Teddy bears may be cuddly, but keeping the Bears in Chicago would be toxic for Mayor Brandon Johnson’s ambitious agenda.
Last year, the Bears organization announced it was looking at departing its longtime home at Soldier Field. The team unveiled lofty plans to build a state-of-the-art stadium and sprawling entertainment complex in northwest suburban Arlington Heights, aimed at expanding its capacity and adding lucrative moneymakers like restaurants, retail space and sports betting.
Now Johnson appears to be making a last-ditch effort to keep the NFL team in Chicago. Don’t do it.
The team has plunked down $197.2 million to purchase the 326-acre Arlington International Racecourse site. Demolition of the site is underway. The town has approved zoning changes and other initiatives to smooth the way.
Recently, news broke that talks to solidify the move have become bogged down, as the team’s efforts to win state aid and reduce its potential tax burden are flailing. Other suburbs are now flooding the zone with alternative offers. On June 2, Bears President and CEO Kevin Warren met with Naperville Mayor Scott Wehrli to discuss moving the team to Illinois’ fourth largest city, which is 28 miles west of Chicago.
The Bears are working their leverage.
A relocation to Arlington Heights “is no longer our singular focus,” Scott Hagel, the Bears senior vice president of marketing and communications, said in a statement. “It is our responsibility to listen to other municipalities in Chicagoland about potential locations that can deliver on this transformational opportunity for our fans, our club and the State of Illinois.”
It’s a dance, and it may be working.
Last week Waukegan Mayor Ann Taylor took a spin, writing to Warren to argue that the Bears belong in her lakefront city.
“Our city’s staff and I invite you and your leadership team to come to Waukegan to learn about the once-in-a-lifetime opportunity our city can offer the Bears,” Taylor wrote in a letter released to the news media Tuesday.
Look for more municipalities to waltz in. These avid suitors get free media attention and a wide-open opportunity to promote their towns.
On June 7, Johnson had a highly publicized meeting with Warren. They issued a joint statement that read in part: “Today we met and discussed our shared values and commitment to the City of Chicago, the importance of deep roots and the need for equitable community investment throughout the city. We are both committed to the idea that the city and its major civic institutions must grow and evolve together to meet the needs of the future. We look forward to continuing the dialogue around these shared values.”
There is nothing in that blah, blah, blah to suggest that Chicago has any hope of keeping the team.
Johnson offered up a misty-eyed memory of growing up to the tune of the “Super Bowl Shuffle,” the 1985 championship theme song. “We want to make sure we can keep shuffling here in the city of Chicago with the Bears,” he told the news media.
That’s a 38-year-old story.
I get it. Johnson must at least appear to entertain “conversations,” as he put it, about keeping our NFL team in the city. But the team has made it clear it won’t stay at Soldier Field. It will never own the Chicago Park District facility and cannot expand it enough to reap the profits it craves.
There has been talk of other city sites, but all would suck up hundreds of millions, if not billions, of investment dollars to tee up. The Bears would demand a raft of financial gimmes the city cannot afford.
Chicago lost the chance to build a state-of-the-art stadium 20 years ago, but then-Mayor Richard M. Daley opted for the controversial $632 million refurbishing of Soldier Field. Chicago’s venue is the smallest football stadium in the NFL, my friend Terry Bannon notes.
Now retired, Bannon is the ultimate Bears aficionado, having covered the team for the Daily Herald from 1978 to 1989 and reported and edited coverage for the Tribune in the 2000s.
Twenty years ago, “I thought, you know, like Daniel Burnham said, ‘Make no little plans,’ but they made a little plan instead of a big plan,” Bannon said.
Johnson may have the itch to one-up his vanquished predecessor. When the Bears started looking around, Mayor Lori Lightfoot was hostile, then made a fantastical offer that would have cost billions of dollars.
Mayor, don’t scratch that itch. You have a slew of other problems worth fixing. A serious play for the Bears would siphon off the goodwill, political capital and hard cash you need for other priorities, like shoring up the city’s bedeviled pension funds, tackling budget shortfalls at Chicago Public Schools and the CTA, and especially your bid to fund $800 million in “investments in people,” i.e., anti-violence programs, youth jobs, economic development and mental health care.
The Bears can play their games, but this is Chicago. No offense to our suburban neighbors, but we don’t have to play with the little kids.
As far as that growing crowd of suitors goes, “I can’t blame (the Bears organization) for answering the phone when somebody else calls,” Bannon said. “But I really think that what they’re going to concentrate on is Arlington Heights, and using whatever leverage they have.”
Chicago Bears, skedaddle. Vamoose. Get outta here.
Laura Washington is a political commentator and longtime Chicago journalist. Her columns appear in the Tribune each Monday. Write to her at LauraLauraWashington@gmail.com.
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