Austin Bonta

And I'm hopeful to be able to say more about that communication piece as time goes on.

What I've told residents, and I've been asked by many, like, how soon are we going to know something?

I say, you know, it could be weeks from now.

It could be tomorrow.

It could be later this afternoon.

Not specifically about the Portage site, but ultimately this is the Bears' decision, and ultimately the Bears are going to determine what is the best site for the team, the best site for the fans.

I'm hopeful that they're going to agree that the Portage site is the best and that our deal is the best offer on the table.

But there are also political and economic things going on that are definitely beyond our control and maybe outside of any one person's control that's going to ultimately influence where the bears go.

We've not been reached out to the Colts, and my understanding of it is there are certainly Colts fans in Portage.

There are certainly Colts fans in northwest Indiana.

But ultimately, northwest Indiana is Bears country.

I have to remind everybody, every time the Bears play the Packers, it's a violation of our city ordinance to wear Packers hats, which always is kind of a big stir, but we've got to make sure that people are aware.

Ultimately, the Bears coming to what we consider to be, well,

The Bears coming to Northwest Indiana is still the Bears coming to Bears country, and it's still the Bears coming to Chicagoland.

We're proud to have that part of our identity here.

It really doesn't.

And to start, it doesn't feel like it was late to the game for us because we started working on this on December 18th.

I guess you could say December 17th because I was on the phone as soon as the statement from the Bears came out and we had people ready to go.

It took us some time to put together a proposal that we believed was

realistic and a proposal that we thought was workable.