‘Illinois cannot afford to lose this’: Local leaders hope to keep Bears in state

While the top elected officials for Arlington Heights, Cook County and Chicago have different preferences for where a new Bears stadium should go, they agreed Thursday it shouldn’t be Northwest Indiana.

The Illinois-based politicians responded Thursday to the NFL franchise’s latest public posture — that a lack of “legislative partnership” in Illinois has prompted the team to expand its stadium search across state lines to the Hoosier state.

Here is what they said in the wake of the Bears’ latest pivot:

Arlington Heights Mayor Jim Tinaglia

“This whole thing about the possibility of them leaving the state of Illinois has to be considered either a very dark day for the entire state, especially Cook County,” Tinaglia said, “or it has to be considered some sort of a wake-up call for everyone in Illinois to recognize and try to get their arms around.”

The mayor, an architect by trade who has worked on big building projects, said he takes the Bears’ possible Northwest Indiana relocation seriously.

“I know what it’s like to be on the other side of the table when you’re trying to make a project happen. I know how difficult and expensive it is. And if it becomes too expensive and too difficult, then the project dies. I’ve had that happen,” he said. “The last thing I want to see happen is that Illinois loses. Illinois cannot afford to lose this. Forget about focusing on Arlington Heights — let’s think about Cook County as a whole and Illinois as a whole. We can’t let that happen.”

Tinaglia called on Illinois legislators to support the Bears’ long-sought request for legislation that would give the football club a massive property tax break — what Bears brass have characterized as tax “certainty” — at their 326-acre Arlington Park property.

Tinaglia believes the request is “reasonable.”

So, too, is the team’s ask for $855 million in funding for infrastructure like roads, utilities and stormwater mitigation, Tinaglia believes.

Until early November, Tinaglia was meeting weekly with Bears officials to finalize site plans and prepare for an extensive municipal review process of the team’s redevelopment project.

But Bears lobbyists left Springfield in late October without their favored megaproject legislation getting called for a vote in either chamber of the General Assembly during the fall veto session. The bill would allow the team to negotiate with local taxing authorities over the amount of taxes that should be paid for up to 40 years.

In his letter to season ticket holders Wednesday, Bears President/CEO Kevin Warren said he was told directly by state leaders that the team’s redevelopment project wouldn’t be a priority in 2026.

“Those were words that they absolutely did not expect to hear,” Tinaglia said. “Now they’re being forced just like any other big project to look at other alternatives.”

The stadium planning process that was underway at Arlington Heights village hall is now in “a holding pattern,” Tinaglia said.

“The Bears decided that it was necessary for everyone to put our pencils down and stop spending money on drawings and designs and engineering until some better confidence that the project can go forward,” he said.

Cook County Board President Toni Preckwinkle

Preckwinkle brokered a meeting last Friday attended by representatives of the Bears, state, county and city of Chicago to again pitch the team on redevelopment of the former Michael Reese Hospital site in Chicago’s Bronzeville neighborhood.

“Not a word” was mentioned about Indiana, she said.

“I want to try to bring everyone to the table and have a conversation about our commitment to trying to keep the Bears in Cook County and Illinois,” Preckwinkle told the Daily Herald. “Needless to say, I’m shocked and disappointed that the Bears would discuss moving to Indiana at this time.”

The Bears previously rejected the 48.6-acre hospital site as too small, as well as due to security concerns because train lines run through the property.

But after team officials saw conceptual renderings showing a stadium that would “fit comfortably,” they committed to walking the site with the local alderman and potential developer, Preckwinkle said.

“So, how we got from that willingness to walk the site and explore its potential to (the) letter (from Warren) … is unfathomable to me,” she said.

Preckwinkle wouldn’t say where the Arlington Heights site is on her list of preferred locales for a new Bears stadium — only that last week’s meeting focused on the Michael Reese site.

She said the Bears need to have “reasonable” proposals about public support for a stadium complex.

“There’s a sentiment — not just my view — but spending hundreds of millions of dollars of tax money on facilities for professional sports teams I don’t think is responsible. Investments in public infrastructure on sites where sports teams might be located is another story.”

Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson

“The Chicago Bears belong in the city of Chicago,” Johnson declared at a news conference. “I still firmly believe that their best position is in Chicago, and the evidence is clearly speaking for itself.”

Though the team’s $4.7 billion plan for a new public stadium on the lakefront was dead on arrival in Springfield last year, the mayor maintains his support for it.

“There’s not been a politician in this city that has worked as long as I have to ensure that the Bears have a package that keeps them, quite frankly, at the most unique special property anywhere in our city,” he said.