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- The Chicago Bears are seeking public funding for a new stadium, threatening to move to Indiana if Illinois lawmakers do not provide it.
- Illinois lawmakers are hesitant to offer public funds, as taxpayers are still paying off debt from the last Soldier Field renovation 25 years ago.
- While the Bears have publicly committed to exploring a move to Hammond, Indiana, they have also kept the door open for negotiations in Illinois.
CHICAGO — Just go already.
In their search for public handouts for a swanky new stadium, the Chicago Bears have become that annoying person who dramatically threatens to do something in hopes of extorting, err, getting, you to do what they want. When you don’t give in, they threaten again.
And again.
And again.
And … you get the picture.
As the Bears prepare for the 2026 season, they are determined to leave Soldier Field, their home of 55 years. The team has committed $2 billion to a new stadium project, but has asked for at least $855 million in public funding, as well as tax breaks.
The problem is Illinois lawmakers aren’t willing to give them the public funding they want to build a new stadium. This is what happens when taxpayers are still on the hook for more than $414 million from the Bears’ last stadium project. Which was only 25 years ago, I might add.
Indiana lawmakers, on the other hand, are tripping over themselves to give the Bears whatever they want to get them to cross the state line.
But it’s obvious the Bears don’t really want to leave Chicago, let alone Illinois, because they continue to play this one-sided game in hopes officials here will change their minds.
Chicago Bears keep door open for Illinois stadium
In an open letter last December, Bears president and CEO Kevin Warren said the team was going to “expand our search and critically evaluate opportunities throughout the wider Chicagoland region, including Northwest Indiana.”
After Indiana created the agency that would issue the bonds needed to build a stadium in Hammond in February, the Bears said they were “committed to finishing the remaining site-specific necessary due diligence to support our vision to build a world-class stadium near the Wolf Lake area in Hammond, Indiana.”
Then, in June, Warren and Bears chairman George McCaskey released another open letter, this one saying the board had voted to “advance our stadium development project in Hammond, Indiana, with the exact site to be selected.” In case any Illinois officials missed that, Warren and McCaskey repeated their intent to move to Indiana on Aug. 13.
And by God, this time they really mean it!
Or … not.
“If there are substantive discussions to be had, let’s have them,” McCaskey said about the possibility of having more discussion with Illinois lawmakers. “In Indiana they’ve been very proactive, very communicative and very solution oriented.”
Then comes word from NFL commissioner Roger Goodell on Aug. 26 that he’s met with Illinois lawmakers to help efforts to keep the Bears in Chicago, and believes a stadium here is still possible.
It’s exhausting. It’s been almost a year of this nonsense, which follows three years of the Bears holding their breath while threatening to go to suburban Arlington Heights, and there still aren’t shovels in the ground anywhere.
There isn’t even a tentative start date yet.
“My wife told me about six months ago, ‘Don’t give any more target dates.’ So just get the work done,” Warren said Aug. 13.
Or maybe just pony up all the money yourselves to get what you really want, like other NFL owners have done.
Opposition is to funding, not Chicago Bears stadium
People in Chicago don’t begrudge the Bears a new stadium. While the view of the Chicago skyline from Soldier Field is unparalleled, the stadium is like something out of the Stone Age when compared with the Taj Mahals of the NFL.
It’s the league’s second-smallest stadium, with a capacity of 61,500, and doesn’t have a dome that would make Super Bowls and Final Fours a possibility. Getting in and out of Soldier Field is a nightmare, and there are high school teams with better amenities for players.
We just don’t want to subsidize the Bears’ construction of another new home.
The Illinois Sports Facilities Authority issued almost $399 million in bonds in 2001 to help pay for the renovation of Solider Field. The bonds were to be paid off with a portion of the city’s hotel tax, with the city’s taxpayers responsible for covering any shortfall.
While the initial bonds have been repaid, they’ve been refinanced three times. The most recent came in 2021, after COVID cratered tourism.
As of Tuesday, Aug. 25, the outstanding tab for taxpayers is $414,398,150, ISFA CEO Frank Bilecki told USA TODAY Sports. Of that, $340,850,000 is principal, Bilecki said.
So you can see why people here, politicians and residents alike, aren’t exactly eager to open their wallets again for the Bears.
Politicians reflecting public view on Bears stadium funding
“The reality is that I wasn’t willing to give up billions of dollars of taxpayer money in order to give it to a billionaire-owned family, or team,” Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker said in June.
“As much of an emotional connection as many of us have to the Bears, and to keeping them in the city of Chicago and the state of Illinois, (the) No. 1 principle is we’re not going to foist this on the taxpayers of the state of Illinois,” Pritzker said.
That reflects the thoughts of the people Pritzker represents.
In a poll of state residents conducted in March by the University of Illinois Springfield’s Center for State Policy and Research, almost 70% said new or renovated stadiums for professional sports teams should be built mostly or entirely with private funding.
When asked how the city and state should negotiate with the Bears, almost 37% said the team should be allowed out of their lease at Soldier Field so they can build a new, privately funded stadium in Illinois. Only 13% said the state should try and outbid Indiana for the team.
“There’s no specific timetable from my standpoint, other than we know that they are looking at the alternate groups, Indiana or Arlington Heights,” Goodell told reporters after the NFL owners meeting on Wednesday, Aug. 26. “We want to make sure that Arlington Heights and Illinois have an opportunity, as well as Indiana, to put their best foot forward.”
Translation: The Bears are going to continue to drag this out in hopes of, finally, getting the answer they want. Because if they really wanted to go to Indiana, they’d already be gone.
Follow USA TODAY Sports columnist Nancy Armour on social media @nrarmour.