SPRINGFIELD — While the Illinois General Assembly didn’t end up passing legislation this session that helped or hurt the Chicago Bears’ stadium efforts, one suburban lawmaker said the legislature got close to a deal on property tax legislation — a measure widely seen as a way to ease a team move to Arlington Heights.
“We were super close and just ran out of time,” state Rep. Mary Beth Canty, a Democrat who represents the northwest suburb and surrounding areas, said Sunday.
The team in mid-May announced it was shifting its focus away from building a new lakefront stadium in Chicago to Arlington Heights, where it purchased the former Arlington International Racecourse property two years ago. Though the spring legislative session ended as the calendar turned to June on Saturday night, legislators will likely get another chance to pass legislation in the fall.
Still, state Rep. Kam Buckner pushed back on the idea that any agreement was close, as no deal was ever actually introduced in the legislature.
“The Bears have made it clear — they no longer want to be in Chicago. That’s their decision,” Buckner, a Chicago Democrat whose district includes Soldier Field, said in a text message Sunday. “But if they want to leave and use state dollars or ask for special tax protections to do it, they’ll have to come through Springfield. And in Springfield, that means facing the Chicago delegation directly.”
Lawmakers this session introduced multiple bills proposing changes to state laws that would better enable so-called megaprojects, like a new Bears stadium, to be built. But compromise language that received some support was never introduced, Canty acknowledged.
The potential changes would give local control to taxing districts statewide, and not simply be a boost to the Bears’ prospects of moving to a specific suburb, she said.
“We’re going to keep working all through the summer. I don’t like to jinx anything and I also don’t like to predict what — where everybody will be” by the fall veto session, Canty said, referring to the next time lawmakers are expected to consider bills. A Bears spokesperson on Sunday reiterated the team’s statement that it has made progress with the leaders in Arlington Heights.
The dream of a new domed stadium in Chicago has faced enormous headwinds in Springfield since the Bears unveiled a proposal last year asking the state to take on $900 million in new debt and spend $1.5 billion on infrastructure improvements.
The franchise likely has a smoother path to move to Arlington Heights, but one of the holdups there was a dispute with the village and local school districts over property taxes.
Language discussed behind closed doors in the waning days of session would have allowed “a weighted vote” of all local taxing bodies to set a property tax payment amount for development projects, while also implementing guardrails from the state on issues like the length of time the agreements could last, Canty said.
Gov. JB Pritzker has made clear that while he personally would like to see the Bears stay in Chicago, he is skeptical of providing taxpayer funds to help a private business build a new stadium.
Buckner said members of the Chicago delegation in both the House and Senate were “all very vigilant in the last days of session, expecting the Bears to try to sneak language through the legislature.”
“I don’t care how many other lawmakers they talk to — there will be no chicanery, no shortcuts, and no sidestepping the people of Chicago,” he wrote.
Asked on Sunday about the prospects for legislation benefiting the Bears, Pritzker said he generally supported options like STAR bonds, a mechanism for local governments to finance big projects, though he emphasized that idea was not specific to the Bears.
The discussion on STAR bonds was separate from the megaprojects proposal discussed in the final days of session, Canty said.
Tribune reporter Jeremy Gorner contributed.