Score caller sounds off about Bears stadium bill stalling in Illinois House
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What challenges are facing the Bears' stadium bill in Illinois?
Mahimi, Harris, and Grody. Of course I follow Mark Grody on Twitter. I love you guys, and I'm thrilled to be here. I've been listening to The Score for many, many, many years. Middays 10 to 2 on 104.3 The Score.
Giant slag heap. It's quite a thing.
It is indeed quite a thing. That is referring to the site in Indiana in Hammond. That was David Hahn, our morning show. Before we get to our calls, 312-644-6767, let's play you some more of what J.B. Pritzker had to say. That was at 11 o'clock this morning. Asked if he would support a bill that would potentially funnel tax revenue directly to a Bears mythical stadium.
Do you support, I should ask, a bill that could potentially give lots of tax revenue directly to stadiums?
It doesn't require that, but yes, it allows a local government because, you know, for example, Arlington Heights and Chicago want to compete in order to have a stadium. And you may recall that the mayor of Chicago held a big press conference with the Bears announcing a $2.5 billion stadium. that he had no money to pay for. So somehow that was going to have to get paid for. And that's not something I was willing to do. And indeed, the amount of money that the state is willing to put up is money that we would put up for a business in the state of Illinois for infrastructure alone, not building a stadium. And that is a choice that people at a local level can make. if they now want to under that Senate bill.
I will say, I have not seen the completed Senate bill or read it, I have to say, nor has my staff, because as the speaker said, it came late and that's okay, things happen. And we had a whole lot of things that were, you know, foisted upon the state that they were dealing with yesterday. But indeed there's, The speaker is going to work hard to make sure that the House is making progress. I will certainly stand alongside them in any way that I can assist in that endeavor. And our hope is that we'll be able to provide something for the bears that will work.
Sorry. Yeah.
We still need that, by the way. 38 states, 38 states have a pilot megaprojects law, 38 states. We are literally behind the curve.
How does the Illinois government plan to address stadium funding?
All we're doing is organizing the way that they negotiate. They've always been negotiating about property taxes all across the country. It's just in Illinois where we have a disorganized, dysfunctional endeavor forever. And now we're trying to organize it and make it work so that businesses will want to come here.
He's right. This is something that a lot of other states do. It's considered pretty commonplace. There's a reason the state of Illinois wanted one of those bills, not just for the Bears, but for other megaprojects.
The governor makes sense in a lot of ways, especially talking about what he's not willing to do as far as paying for a stadium. To build, though.
And he's right. He asked the same question about whatever the plan is regarding the city of Chicago's interest in this from a legislative standpoint. He asked the same question that I'm asking.
I love how he like says to the mayor of Chicago held a press conference two years ago asking for two billion dollars. Doesn't even mention his name. The mayor of Chicago.
But he's right.
I'm not saying he's wrong. It's just that the tone is hilarious.
The tone is intentional.
Also, does that qualify for is this petty because he didn't say his name? Yes.
Probably. In this case, absolutely.
It does. Just when you think those two are on the same page, it's like, whee.
And listen, Brandon Johnson's been on our show before. So this may be a time where we reach out to him and say, hey, what side are you talking about? Make it make sense for us. Like the only one who can fill in the gaps here on what happened might just be him. It's either him or the Bears. So that would be a welcome invitation.
We'll keep a line open for you, Mayor. 312-644-6767 is the number. That's a number that people can call right now, too. We've got a lot of calls. Yeah, yeah. Where should the Bears build their new stadium and why?
Yeah, we start with Bill in Kentucky.
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Chapters
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