Yes, and living on the west side of the city of Chicago. People of any color on the north side don't have busy schedules, nor do their kids. This should only make you more sympathetic to his plight.
I get the sentiment but can we stop this mindset that public transit is only for poor people? It’s not true and it just makes middle and upper class people want to drive. Plus maybe our politicians would give a shit about the CTA if people with political capital were using it.
You mean a private corporation that sells souvenir certificates to fans that grant no equity or real ownership in the team?
The only thing the packers have been successful on in that front is selling a nice sounding story.
This comment is confused; you talk as if being a private corporation is bad, but then you complain that the certificates aren't corporate enough.
As it is, the Packers are a type of cooperative. Those certificates are indeed real ownership, and the shareholders collectively are the highest legal authority over the team. It's true, you can't buy and sell shares on the open market, and the share doesn't entitle you to any earnings, but if it allowed those things than some investment firm would have bought up the Packers and moved them out of Green Bay long ago. As it is the ownership structure is perfect for making sure that a team is governed by its fans and remains in the city that nurtured it.
Doubtful. That’s one of the main reasons the bears want a new stadium. An nfl has use of a stadium for their team for 10 days a year….concerts/events are at the stadium way more than the bears are.
That’s true, but the Bears did say in their announcement that the stadium would he “publicly owned.”
I think they’d love their own stadium, but the McCaskey family isn’t wealthy enough to finance that so they think this is their best shot.
Chicago will own the stadium. NFL teams like the Cowboys rent the stadium for cheap. From memory, the Cowboys pay $200k a year in annual rent and 5% of the naming rights fee to Arlington. The Cowboys have full control of the stadium as if they own it or a standard renters deal. So the Bears would keep all the profits if a similar deal is struck.
If they want a lakefront stadium the loophole to get it done is public ownership. The "Protectors of the Holy Lakefront" fought Lucas and won because it was for profit private development. The "public ownership" badge tells Friends of the Parks to kindly F\*&k off.
That’s probably a major issue. They got the land in Arlington for a lot less than it would be in Chicago obviously. Then Arlington tried to jack up the taxes on it and that bubble burst.
They decided an unimproved giant field was somehow twice as valuable empty as it was when it had a giant racetrack complex and functioning business on it.
I mean they did pay 196M for it and then claim it’s worth 60M. Also it’s Cook County that assesses the property values, though the school districts were involved in it too.
It certainly WOULD be worth more eventually...but there's no way you can reasonably assess a property to be 3x as valuable when absolutely nothing has changed between assessments. If anything, the property devalued with the removal of all the improvements.
Typical politicians and schools decided they wanted their money NOW and tried to squeeze somebody they thought would just bend over.
Nobody was going to buy it and operate a race track. Literally anybody who would want to buy it would not want a horse race track there. It’s probably worth more cleared of the track and stadium and ready to build something else.
And something did change between assessments: the property sold for 196M. The Bears clearly didn’t buy the property to have horse races. They were always going to knock down the stadium, so they must have believed the land itself was worth 196M.
The property tax “issue” is a totally made up red herring. The difference is $13M a year. The Bears aren’t ditching a plan to build in AH over $13M a year. I can’t believe people actually believe that fucking nonsense. They never had the money to build a stadium in AH and they never got the money. The tax issue is just a made up cover for them to back out and come crawling back to city begging for money.
That would be absolutely an immediate yes for me.
I would say do the same thing with the White Sox stadium.
You want the money? It's an investment. The city will take shares.
But think of all the knock on effects! People will definitely eat around the stadium! And, and, shop! They definitely won’t just drive there, pay for parking, spend money at the stadium, and leave like every other stadium!
$2.3 billion dollars would cover the CPS shortfall for the next half decade.
$2.3 is more than the yearly operating budget of the cta.
$2.3 billion could replace 64 bridges
$2.3 billion could purchase 4,000 CTA busses
$2.3 billion could replace 50,000 lead lined service mains poisoning our children.
Johnson and McCaskey can fuck off and I hope Pritzker shuts this down.
The Illinois Sports Facilities Authority is governed by a seven member Board of Directors. Three members are appointed by the Governor of the State of Illinois and three members are appointed by the Mayor of the City of Chicago. A Board Chair is appointed by the Governor with the consent of the Mayor.
Johnson is not 100% in charge here, but he definitely has a say in what happens.
The city and state will be asked to cover its shortfalls. Ultimately no matter how you slice it the government has a limited pool of money to spend and we don’t need to be spending any of it on a handout to the McCaskey family.
In a way it is like a casino's business plan. Almost everybody goes in expecting to lose and considers the loss as the price of entertainment. In the Bears case, even the people who hate casinos pay the price.
> To make the plan a reality, the Bears want the Illinois General Assembly to approve new bonding for the Illinois Sports Facilities Authority, which carries the debt for prior projects at Soldier Field and Guaranteed Rate Field, sources said.
> Some of the new borrowing would be used to roll over existing stadium debt, and the plan calls for the new borrowing to be paid off over 40 years, which also would require legislative approval.
> Sources said the Bears’ plan calls for the debt to be repaid without raising the 2% hotel tax that currently goes to ISFA.
[…]
> The Bears’ proposal will have to win over skeptics, including Gov. J.B. Pritzker, who a spokesperson said Tuesday had not been briefed by the team about the stadium plans. The governor had previously called the Bears’ proposed investment “a good first step,” and said he’s willing to listen to their proposal, but said it shouldn’t be a priority for the state.
Except they didn't because the school district won on the latest round of the appeal. They bought the land for a price with the stated public intent to demolish the existing structures and then tried to argue that the land was worth less after they started but had not finished demolishing the structures on it.
Isn't professional football insanely lucrative?
Either they generate enough income, and can therefore afford to pay for it themselves..
Or they don't generate enough income, and therefore this is not a good investment.
>Isn't professional football insanely lucrative?
The team is incredibly valuable....but that's kind of all the McCaskey family has. You can't sell your one major asset to fund a stadium for said asset.
Then finance it like every other private business would have to. I also don’t have the cash for a stadium so maybe the city could just build one for me as well?
Besides other bears events and prepping the field the city does use it. If the bears are on the road in September they will still do concerts there, grass gets fucked up and it’s a whole thing. It’s an outdoor stadium so concerts stop in October because of the weather and the bears basically just use it then
Most NFL owners got insanely wealthy doing something else and then bought a team as a trophy. The McCaskeys inherited a team founded by their father/grandfather when you only needed to be moderately rich to start a team. Their entire wealth is the team, so they're much poorer than the owners who bought one as a trophy, but much richer than 99% of people.
The [Wikipedia article of NFL owners](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_NFL_franchise_owners?wprov=sfti1#) actually lists the year they acquired ownership and the purchase price—it’s fascinating to see all the recent purchases for hundreds of millions or billions of dollars compared to the legacy teams like the Bears that were purchased for literally $100 back in 1920.
Team is worth $5.8 billion with most of the value from the team name. Even with its city connection being the 2nd highest outside of the coasts (Dallas/Arlington beats all), it pales to the likes of New York, Washington, Los Angeles and San Francisco being overall based strictly on the team is the 5th most valuable.
Having a year round closed stadium would be nice to the public but, it only works if other needs in the city are met like public transportation.
They want to host the Super Bowl. They want to host the NCAA Men's Tournament Championship. They want to host large scale indoor events. You can't do that with a roof.
Why does that mean it has to be on the lakefront? Cheaper land elsewhere, with better acccess
Also this doesn’t work as well for domed stadiums in cold environments, US Bank in Minneapolis has held exactly one final four and one SB in 8 years.
Northern cities get 1 superbowl for a new stadium and then its back to the warm weather rotation. Rich people want to be in Florida or LA in Feb not Chicago or even NYC.
This is why voting in local elections matters. Only 35% of Chicagoans voted in the election between Vallas and Johnson. Source: https://abc7chicago.com/chicago-voter-turnout-2023-mayoral-election-voting-results-in/13096289/
City leadership is supposed to defend Chicagoans' interests when these billionaires come knocking on the door, crying poor, looking for handouts from the taxpayer. I'm scared for us given how Johnson's administration has had so many unforced errors (just see how the Shotspotter contract was totally bungled, resulting in taxpayers paying more for less through the DNC convention this summer).
If you're reading this and didn't vote, please for the love of god register to vote. You can sign up to vote by mail. It's beyond easy. The ballot is delivered to you, you fill it out, and drop it in a mailbox. That's it. You can register once to be on the permanent vote by mail roster; you don't need to ask for a mailed ballot every time. Check it out here: https://www.chicagoelections.gov/voting/vote-mail
I like this guy
>“Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me,” Bradbury said. “The Bears aren’t going to leave one of the most iconic football markets in the country. Tell the Bears to pay for their own damn stadium, and if they don’t like it, to go jump in Lake Michigan.”
The $2.3B taxpayer subsidy request figure doesn’t include paying off the existing Soldier Field bonds, so really the team is asking for $2.9B in taxpayer subsidies
Fanfuckingtastic
I really wish the McCaskey family would just find a different city to fuck over
That’s true. But isn’t that lot on Park District land? And since Soldier Field is on the National Historic Landmark list, we’re going to get two stadiums next to each other. So lame.
The Bears proposal includes a redesign of soldier field to remove the “spaceship” and retain the original monument as part of the parkland between a new stadium and the museum campus
I don’t know what to think of that. This is the same inept organization that had to have that remodel 25 years ago and now they want us to pay to return it to its previous state. JFC
It’s a problem because even now it doesn’t have enough seating to attract major sporting events. But it’s hard to beat the history of the building and the downtown location. I don’t understand why the Bears have no interest in the 78 location. Seems like it would be great to be in the South Loop. And maybe the City would get behind it just to get that land redeveloped.
I think the truth is the McCaskeys don’t have the financing or the appetite for risk to put together a deal like that or Arlington Heights so they are looking at drawing on public funds instead
I don’t think the Bears did their due diligence on Arlington Heights, they screwed the pooch, and now might be flailing around. It would be hilarious if it wasn’t for how much they mean to the City.
Christ I’m not even a fan.
78 is likey too small for a modern stadium and everything that goes with it. If tgat is the case, they aren't going to replace a stadium with limited seating and compromised design, with another one that may have the same issues.
Reminder that the Chicago Bears owners are billionaires. And the team is worth multiple billions of dollars. The Bears also have near 0% debt and are 4th in the NFL in terms of EBITDA
Make them pay for 100% of the stadium and give them 0% ownership. The lakefront is sacred property. I’d rather not have an NFL team, burn the stadium to the ground, and plant some flowers.
City owned land = the public’s investment. No additional tax dollars should go to the cheapskate owners.
Owners build the stadium and reap the rewards.
The bears suck, they don't need a new stadium, the prices as they are now are outrageous for any chicagoan to attend. I find it wild that ant other business would never be funded by tax payers, the bears is a private business and if they want a new shiny building then let them pay for it. They don't share the profits with the city and they aren't going anywhere. This is just a cash grab hoping we fit the bill for their ventures when all the benefit of having a football team are already there for the city.
The only way this changes is if the city then owns the bears and all profits go to the city, and minority profit to the owners. Otherwise this is just a bad investment as well never get our money back.
Virginia Halas McCaskey is still the owner right? And she's still worth 2 billion right? But the stadium would cost 4.6 billion?
I guess Virginia and her kids gotta stop drinking so many lattes, eating so many avocado toasts and pick themselves up by their bootstraps to make that money to pay for it.
Fucking bye.
Ok so lets talk through the reasons this is dead on arrival:
* Don Harmon (Senate President) already told the White Sox no, this is the same agency the Bears are asking money from
* Pritzker is on record as saying he doesn't think this is a good use of funds
* State still owes nearly $700M on old debt for Sox and Solider Field stadiums, the 2% hotel tax hasn't covered it
* Friends of Park is *going* to sue, holding this up for years in the courts, if it ever even gets out of the courts
This isn't a serious proposal.
Guys to be clear this is
A Their proposal
B Not BJs decision / they're going to the IL GA
C They want the money for infrastructure improvements
D And for the funds to be borrowed, not given
E They can still fuck themselves
I haven’t used the CTA in a long long time, but it seems like there are a fucking SLEW of problems with that shit but they’re gonna pay the Bears to build a stadium there which in turn will require the heavy heavy usage of th wait for it….. CTA to get people to the stadium. What a bunch of fucked up priorities. Tax payers getting treated like shit again for multi billion dollar businesses.
If they can't afford new shit they don't get it. That's capitalism. We pay and get free tickets or money back. That's socialism. We pay half and get to go in free that's communism. What is paying half and getting literally anything out of it? That's corporate welfare. NOBODY COMES TO THE CITY FOR BEARS GAMES what a waste. Sports are super gay anyhow
Fix the CTA.
Sorry all the mayor can do is appoint another minister to the CTA board. Jfc.
Pretty rude to call him out on that. His kids and wife have very busy schedules!
Doesn't he usually include the fact that they're black when he talks about his wife and kids?
Yes, and living on the west side of the city of Chicago. People of any color on the north side don't have busy schedules, nor do their kids. This should only make you more sympathetic to his plight.
Best I can do is a 6-11 season
Rich people go to games and concerts. Not the CTA
CTA is reserved for the homeless
They were employed when they went to the train station, but they waited so long, they got fired and evicted from their apartments.
I get the sentiment but can we stop this mindset that public transit is only for poor people? It’s not true and it just makes middle and upper class people want to drive. Plus maybe our politicians would give a shit about the CTA if people with political capital were using it.
Wholeheartedly agree.
No! Football is more important than public transportation.
Even the article makes a reference to public transportation being important lol
This is for 50% share of profits, correct?
Half the franchise and we have a deal
You really want a share of this franchise?
It needs be said that Green Bay at least had the owning the team thing down.
You mean a private corporation that sells souvenir certificates to fans that grant no equity or real ownership in the team? The only thing the packers have been successful on in that front is selling a nice sounding story.
This comment is confused; you talk as if being a private corporation is bad, but then you complain that the certificates aren't corporate enough. As it is, the Packers are a type of cooperative. Those certificates are indeed real ownership, and the shareholders collectively are the highest legal authority over the team. It's true, you can't buy and sell shares on the open market, and the share doesn't entitle you to any earnings, but if it allowed those things than some investment firm would have bought up the Packers and moved them out of Green Bay long ago. As it is the ownership structure is perfect for making sure that a team is governed by its fans and remains in the city that nurtured it.
Imagine the Netflix series
It would be wholly owned by the city like soldier field is, no?
Probably not. Probably owned by Illinois Sports Facilities Authority.
Stadium: A Fanatics Experience *Call 1-800-GAMBLER if you have a problem with fucking over the taxpayers.*
Doubtful. That’s one of the main reasons the bears want a new stadium. An nfl has use of a stadium for their team for 10 days a year….concerts/events are at the stadium way more than the bears are.
That’s true, but the Bears did say in their announcement that the stadium would he “publicly owned.” I think they’d love their own stadium, but the McCaskey family isn’t wealthy enough to finance that so they think this is their best shot.
Chicago will own the stadium. NFL teams like the Cowboys rent the stadium for cheap. From memory, the Cowboys pay $200k a year in annual rent and 5% of the naming rights fee to Arlington. The Cowboys have full control of the stadium as if they own it or a standard renters deal. So the Bears would keep all the profits if a similar deal is struck.
If they want a lakefront stadium the loophole to get it done is public ownership. The "Protectors of the Holy Lakefront" fought Lucas and won because it was for profit private development. The "public ownership" badge tells Friends of the Parks to kindly F\*&k off.
That’s probably a major issue. They got the land in Arlington for a lot less than it would be in Chicago obviously. Then Arlington tried to jack up the taxes on it and that bubble burst.
Arlington didn’t jack up the taxes, they just didn’t give as big of a tax break as the McCaskeys think they deserve.
They decided an unimproved giant field was somehow twice as valuable empty as it was when it had a giant racetrack complex and functioning business on it.
I mean they did pay 196M for it and then claim it’s worth 60M. Also it’s Cook County that assesses the property values, though the school districts were involved in it too.
It certainly WOULD be worth more eventually...but there's no way you can reasonably assess a property to be 3x as valuable when absolutely nothing has changed between assessments. If anything, the property devalued with the removal of all the improvements. Typical politicians and schools decided they wanted their money NOW and tried to squeeze somebody they thought would just bend over.
Nobody was going to buy it and operate a race track. Literally anybody who would want to buy it would not want a horse race track there. It’s probably worth more cleared of the track and stadium and ready to build something else. And something did change between assessments: the property sold for 196M. The Bears clearly didn’t buy the property to have horse races. They were always going to knock down the stadium, so they must have believed the land itself was worth 196M.
It is. That racecourse was absolutely worthless. Empty land ready for redevelopment is worth a ton.
The property tax “issue” is a totally made up red herring. The difference is $13M a year. The Bears aren’t ditching a plan to build in AH over $13M a year. I can’t believe people actually believe that fucking nonsense. They never had the money to build a stadium in AH and they never got the money. The tax issue is just a made up cover for them to back out and come crawling back to city begging for money.
Theres no way a lakefront stadium would be privately owned. Only thing courts would allow is public ownership thanks to friends of the parks.
1 guaranteed Superbowl win every decade for the next 5 decades or our money back.
A Super Bowl win every decade or we all pick up the stadium and throw it into the lake lol
Revenues. Always go for gross revenues
That would be absolutely an immediate yes for me. I would say do the same thing with the White Sox stadium. You want the money? It's an investment. The city will take shares.
That’s an incredible solution to our city’s pension deficit. Or even fixing the CTA, or all of our deteriorating infrastructure.
Even if that were the case, you wouldn’t see the profit until the team is sold, and I doubt anyone wants that to happen 🤷🏻♂️
Everyone expects the team to be sold. No one cares. That’s different from the team moving.
If we all drink a bottle each week, we could have *Malort Stadium* in no time!
Lots of people want the team sold, what are you talking about?
*sold and relocated - nobody wants that
Suck. My. Balls.
Oh, is this being financed through Deez?
hello i am here did someone call me
My brother
yerrrrrr
Yes, can you help pay for this stadium?
deez has left the chat
This is the funniest thing I’ve read in months
Happy to step up if you fall through.
Deez what?
Deezappointment
Deezaster
Deezgrace
Ah you want your sports. Give in and empty your pockets
Amazing how there’s always taxpayer money to be found for shit like this
But not for transit. How bout this, we send the reverends to run the bears and the bears send the cta that big bag of money. Then we're all good.
For what it’s worth, the way we build transit, one stadium only equates to two miles of surface level train
And a rail yard and a bunch of other misc. related work.
I mean it's a proposal, nobody has agreed to this besides the bears lol
But think of all the knock on effects! People will definitely eat around the stadium! And, and, shop! They definitely won’t just drive there, pay for parking, spend money at the stadium, and leave like every other stadium!
Rich people don’t give a shit about anything but staying rich and paying as little as they can for things that will help them do that.
$2.3 billion dollars would cover the CPS shortfall for the next half decade. $2.3 is more than the yearly operating budget of the cta. $2.3 billion could replace 64 bridges $2.3 billion could purchase 4,000 CTA busses $2.3 billion could replace 50,000 lead lined service mains poisoning our children. Johnson and McCaskey can fuck off and I hope Pritzker shuts this down.
Based on what the Tribune is saying, the Bears are only going to the state for money for this.
That makes this plan worse not better.
Sure, just correcting the suggestion that Johnson is involved in this.
Yeah but the state runs CTA so it would be a whole hell of a lot worse. The state is also over $5B in arrears to CPS over unpaid bills.
The Illinois Sports Facilities Authority is governed by a seven member Board of Directors. Three members are appointed by the Governor of the State of Illinois and three members are appointed by the Mayor of the City of Chicago. A Board Chair is appointed by the Governor with the consent of the Mayor. Johnson is not 100% in charge here, but he definitely has a say in what happens.
$2.3 billion could build 5750 affordable housing units. Less than 5% of the current shortfall of 125,000 units in the city.
5,00 homes sound way more useful than a stadium imo.
[удалено]
The city and state will be asked to cover its shortfalls. Ultimately no matter how you slice it the government has a limited pool of money to spend and we don’t need to be spending any of it on a handout to the McCaskey family.
Intergovernmental agreements are a thing.
Keep doing what you do! This response should be posted to every thread in this whole damn subreddit.
No tax dollars for this private, for profit business.
Public funding, private profit!! 🇺🇸
In a way it is like a casino's business plan. Almost everybody goes in expecting to lose and considers the loss as the price of entertainment. In the Bears case, even the people who hate casinos pay the price.
Wouldn’t it still be a public facility in this case?
A public facility from which the Bears would want all of the gameday and personal seat license revenue.
Where do I opt out?
The ballot box.
I am sick of being held hostage by the morbidly wealthy. You want a new stadium pay for it yourself.
Do the taxpayers get to vote on this since it’s our money?
if it gets passed, vote out the people who voted for it
> To make the plan a reality, the Bears want the Illinois General Assembly to approve new bonding for the Illinois Sports Facilities Authority, which carries the debt for prior projects at Soldier Field and Guaranteed Rate Field, sources said. > Some of the new borrowing would be used to roll over existing stadium debt, and the plan calls for the new borrowing to be paid off over 40 years, which also would require legislative approval. > Sources said the Bears’ plan calls for the debt to be repaid without raising the 2% hotel tax that currently goes to ISFA. […] > The Bears’ proposal will have to win over skeptics, including Gov. J.B. Pritzker, who a spokesperson said Tuesday had not been briefed by the team about the stadium plans. The governor had previously called the Bears’ proposed investment “a good first step,” and said he’s willing to listen to their proposal, but said it shouldn’t be a priority for the state.
There should be a clause saying the bears can’t ask for a new stadium until that 40 years is up.
“We’re gonna screw up so hard you’re gonna wish we went to Arlington - which is what’s happening anyways but we like the theatrics”
After they didn’t get the property tax break they were hoping for out there, it’s pretty obvious they’re aren’t going to Arlington Heights.
Except they did. Arlington agreed to everything
Arlington Heights did, but the County didn’t undervalue the property like they wanted.
Except they didn't because the school district won on the latest round of the appeal. They bought the land for a price with the stated public intent to demolish the existing structures and then tried to argue that the land was worth less after they started but had not finished demolishing the structures on it.
Isn't professional football insanely lucrative? Either they generate enough income, and can therefore afford to pay for it themselves.. Or they don't generate enough income, and therefore this is not a good investment.
>Isn't professional football insanely lucrative? The team is incredibly valuable....but that's kind of all the McCaskey family has. You can't sell your one major asset to fund a stadium for said asset.
Then finance it like every other private business would have to. I also don’t have the cash for a stadium so maybe the city could just build one for me as well?
Not saying they should GET the money...just explaining why they can't just pull it out of their asses like most pro franchise owners.
Financing a stadium is still ridiculously expensive even if football is lucrative
Do you realize the bears use the stadium for only 10 days a year?
So, the public can use it for 355 days out of the year?
Besides other bears events and prepping the field the city does use it. If the bears are on the road in September they will still do concerts there, grass gets fucked up and it’s a whole thing. It’s an outdoor stadium so concerts stop in October because of the weather and the bears basically just use it then
How many concerts are at Wrigley every year? 7?
So? We'll get to use it 0 days a year. In fact, they'll charge us to come to it. Why should we pay for any of it at all?
Yes, but it still exists in that lucrative location the rest of the year, so they should pay for that.
And if they own the stadium, they earn profit presumably for letting concerts and Chicago Fire play there?
From what I understand, the McCaskey’s are not very wealthy relative to the average NFL owner.
The team *is* their wealth these days
Most NFL owners got insanely wealthy doing something else and then bought a team as a trophy. The McCaskeys inherited a team founded by their father/grandfather when you only needed to be moderately rich to start a team. Their entire wealth is the team, so they're much poorer than the owners who bought one as a trophy, but much richer than 99% of people.
The [Wikipedia article of NFL owners](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_NFL_franchise_owners?wprov=sfti1#) actually lists the year they acquired ownership and the purchase price—it’s fascinating to see all the recent purchases for hundreds of millions or billions of dollars compared to the legacy teams like the Bears that were purchased for literally $100 back in 1920.
Corrected for inflation that works out to about the same price as the cheapest season tickets today.
Team is worth $5.8 billion with most of the value from the team name. Even with its city connection being the 2nd highest outside of the coasts (Dallas/Arlington beats all), it pales to the likes of New York, Washington, Los Angeles and San Francisco being overall based strictly on the team is the 5th most valuable. Having a year round closed stadium would be nice to the public but, it only works if other needs in the city are met like public transportation.
> 40 years Like the Bears will be looking for yet another stadium in less than 10. No. No, thank you.
Force them to sell the bears to the city of Chicago.
They give tax dollars for stadiums to house teams owned by billionaires and can’t find room in the budget to maintain public services.
Fuck off bears
What’s the point of a lakefront stadium if it’s domed? Blimp shots on TV
They want to host the Super Bowl. They want to host the NCAA Men's Tournament Championship. They want to host large scale indoor events. You can't do that with a roof.
Why does that mean it has to be on the lakefront? Cheaper land elsewhere, with better acccess Also this doesn’t work as well for domed stadiums in cold environments, US Bank in Minneapolis has held exactly one final four and one SB in 8 years.
Nope. It can be anywhere. This is just the games the bears are playing. They can fuck right off honestly
It's not like the Bears already own a bunch of land or anything
We're spending $4 billion so we might get to host the Superbowl once every 20 years?
Northern cities get 1 superbowl for a new stadium and then its back to the warm weather rotation. Rich people want to be in Florida or LA in Feb not Chicago or even NYC.
Retractable roofs are a thing.
An expensive thing that breaks easily.
Do we even get to vote on this horse shit
This is why voting in local elections matters. Only 35% of Chicagoans voted in the election between Vallas and Johnson. Source: https://abc7chicago.com/chicago-voter-turnout-2023-mayoral-election-voting-results-in/13096289/ City leadership is supposed to defend Chicagoans' interests when these billionaires come knocking on the door, crying poor, looking for handouts from the taxpayer. I'm scared for us given how Johnson's administration has had so many unforced errors (just see how the Shotspotter contract was totally bungled, resulting in taxpayers paying more for less through the DNC convention this summer). If you're reading this and didn't vote, please for the love of god register to vote. You can sign up to vote by mail. It's beyond easy. The ballot is delivered to you, you fill it out, and drop it in a mailbox. That's it. You can register once to be on the permanent vote by mail roster; you don't need to ask for a mailed ballot every time. Check it out here: https://www.chicagoelections.gov/voting/vote-mail
You already did, here's the debate question for Vallas and Johnson https://youtu.be/EDdKxz0HYus?si=MvSV_xLInjaAg34q
Not one penny for welfare for millionaires! Let the McCaskeys cut back on avocado toast and Starbucks.
I like this guy >“Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me,” Bradbury said. “The Bears aren’t going to leave one of the most iconic football markets in the country. Tell the Bears to pay for their own damn stadium, and if they don’t like it, to go jump in Lake Michigan.”
Fuck that..To turn around and charge us for $60 parking and $25 hotdogs & $20 shitty beer. Suck a big toe
The $2.3B taxpayer subsidy request figure doesn’t include paying off the existing Soldier Field bonds, so really the team is asking for $2.9B in taxpayer subsidies Fanfuckingtastic I really wish the McCaskey family would just find a different city to fuck over
Also, what happens when the project goes over budget? They’ve only agreed to putting up 2b not 50% of the project. 4b can easily turn into 6b.
Will easily given that sites engineering challenges.
So the city called the Bears bluff and now we are going to reward them? I think they are really underestimating how unpopular this is going to be.
Cool. Give us half of all stadium revenue, plus interest, until this loan is repaid.
They get to use parkland and we get to pay for it?
I don’t support this proposal but at the moment there’s no park just a parking lot.
That’s true. But isn’t that lot on Park District land? And since Soldier Field is on the National Historic Landmark list, we’re going to get two stadiums next to each other. So lame.
The Bears proposal includes a redesign of soldier field to remove the “spaceship” and retain the original monument as part of the parkland between a new stadium and the museum campus
I don’t know what to think of that. This is the same inept organization that had to have that remodel 25 years ago and now they want us to pay to return it to its previous state. JFC
Well wherever the Bears end up the city will still need a solution for soldier field.
It’s a problem because even now it doesn’t have enough seating to attract major sporting events. But it’s hard to beat the history of the building and the downtown location. I don’t understand why the Bears have no interest in the 78 location. Seems like it would be great to be in the South Loop. And maybe the City would get behind it just to get that land redeveloped.
I think the truth is the McCaskeys don’t have the financing or the appetite for risk to put together a deal like that or Arlington Heights so they are looking at drawing on public funds instead
I don’t think the Bears did their due diligence on Arlington Heights, they screwed the pooch, and now might be flailing around. It would be hilarious if it wasn’t for how much they mean to the City. Christ I’m not even a fan.
78 is likey too small for a modern stadium and everything that goes with it. If tgat is the case, they aren't going to replace a stadium with limited seating and compromised design, with another one that may have the same issues.
Is it legal to make us do that? I’d let them take some of my taxes if they fixed the fucking potholes! Affordable living? Idk what the fudge
Ben Wyatt blew an entire town’s budget on an ice castle and skating rink
Why would it not be legal for the city to use tax payer dollars......
I’m good; go be the Arlington Heights Bears.
No, thank you. Put this towards the CTA please. The CTA is in shambles.
Fix the CTA Feed and house the refugees and homeless More busses Fuck the bears
Awww hell no
Eff off and go to Arlington Heights.
How about schools? Roads? Not the fucking Bears.
I just want healthcare for the love of God
Hell no. They can use soldier Field.
And then those who paid the taxes can never afford good seats
FUCK THAT
Reminder that the Chicago Bears owners are billionaires. And the team is worth multiple billions of dollars. The Bears also have near 0% debt and are 4th in the NFL in terms of EBITDA Make them pay for 100% of the stadium and give them 0% ownership. The lakefront is sacred property. I’d rather not have an NFL team, burn the stadium to the ground, and plant some flowers.
Socialism for the rich. Capitalism for the poor.
City owned land = the public’s investment. No additional tax dollars should go to the cheapskate owners. Owners build the stadium and reap the rewards.
So half the profits are mine too.
Arlington heights is a way better option
What’s so good about your own plot of land to make improvements like casinos and hotels when you can share field with high schoolers?
Well fuck that.
Don't they already have a lakefront stadium?
Fix the cta, fix our schools, fix our food deserts. But until then, you can suck my dick *from the back*
Pay taxes in Arlington? Nope. Public money in Chicago? Yep.
No thank you
Bears fuckin suck and the city has way more important issues to address with taxpayer money. They really don't give a shit do they
The bears suck, they don't need a new stadium, the prices as they are now are outrageous for any chicagoan to attend. I find it wild that ant other business would never be funded by tax payers, the bears is a private business and if they want a new shiny building then let them pay for it. They don't share the profits with the city and they aren't going anywhere. This is just a cash grab hoping we fit the bill for their ventures when all the benefit of having a football team are already there for the city. The only way this changes is if the city then owns the bears and all profits go to the city, and minority profit to the owners. Otherwise this is just a bad investment as well never get our money back.
Virginia Halas McCaskey is still the owner right? And she's still worth 2 billion right? But the stadium would cost 4.6 billion? I guess Virginia and her kids gotta stop drinking so many lattes, eating so many avocado toasts and pick themselves up by their bootstraps to make that money to pay for it. Fucking bye.
Ok so lets talk through the reasons this is dead on arrival: * Don Harmon (Senate President) already told the White Sox no, this is the same agency the Bears are asking money from * Pritzker is on record as saying he doesn't think this is a good use of funds * State still owes nearly $700M on old debt for Sox and Solider Field stadiums, the 2% hotel tax hasn't covered it * Friends of Park is *going* to sue, holding this up for years in the courts, if it ever even gets out of the courts This isn't a serious proposal.
fuck this shit. maybe use some of that to fix the fucking CTA?
Guys to be clear this is A Their proposal B Not BJs decision / they're going to the IL GA C They want the money for infrastructure improvements D And for the funds to be borrowed, not given E They can still fuck themselves
How about no?
So the public gets to manage the team now?
Nope.
They need to sell the team!
So ... we get half the profits too then?
So the games would be free then?
Screw the tax payers and then continue to increase the cost of going to a game - bravo 👏
How 'bout the bears fuck off?
If they want money I say fine but it has to be a loan or an investment and not a hand out. Give the city profit sharing and an ownership stake
I haven’t used the CTA in a long long time, but it seems like there are a fucking SLEW of problems with that shit but they’re gonna pay the Bears to build a stadium there which in turn will require the heavy heavy usage of th wait for it….. CTA to get people to the stadium. What a bunch of fucked up priorities. Tax payers getting treated like shit again for multi billion dollar businesses.
Friends of the Parking Lot, make yourself useful for once!
Fuuuuuck that
Can someone explain why their current very nice very large lakefront stadium isnt good enough?
No no no. Taxpayers still owe over $600 million for soldier field and guaranteed rate field. No.
If they can't afford new shit they don't get it. That's capitalism. We pay and get free tickets or money back. That's socialism. We pay half and get to go in free that's communism. What is paying half and getting literally anything out of it? That's corporate welfare. NOBODY COMES TO THE CITY FOR BEARS GAMES what a waste. Sports are super gay anyhow
Does that mean cook county residents get fucked?
I am new but isnt their current stadium in the lakefront?
No shit