The Bears face an uphill climb when it comes to getting taxpayer money for a new stadium. In a keynote speech at the 120th annual meeting of the Chicagoland Chamber of Commerce, Bears CEO Kevin Warren tried to encourage the city’s business community to support the effort.
Via Crain’s Chicago Business, Warren tied the new stadium to the city’s future. After the session, Warren told reporters that “‘Chicago is our focus’ and ‘at some point in time we’ll get something worked out.’”
According to the Chicago Tribune, Warren “questioned the city’s outlook” without the stadium. He pointed out that Chicago has slipped in a ranking of the world’s best cities, with “high commercial vacancy and few cranes in the sky.”
There has been resistance from politicians about public funding for a new stadium. It’s not a new dynamic. Plenty of cities and states don’t want to pay for sports venues. Especially not NFL stadiums, given the ongoing explosion in franchise values.
The teams best positioned to get what they want are the ones with real leverage. In Jacksonville, for example, it was obvious that the Jaguars had a viable Plan B in London. In contrast, it’s nearly impossible to imagine the Bears moving out of Chicago.
At most, they’d build in the suburbs. And those options apparently have been exhausted.
So if the Bears can’t get free money to help pay for the stadium, the choices become build it themselves or don’t build it at all.