Illinois House passes bill to aid Bears stadium
· Yahoo Sports
Indiana is ready and willing to build a stadium for the Bears. Illinois is still trying to prove that it's able.
Via the Chicago Sun-Times, the Illinois House of Representatives has passed a bill that creates a property-tax incentive for the Bears to build their new venue on property the team owns in Arlington Heights.
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The measure, passed by a vote of 78-32, would allow the Bears to skip traditional property taxes in lieu of negotiated (and undoubtedly far lower) payments. The Illinois Senate will now take up the issue.
Tax breaks are a different way to funnel taxpayer money into a stadium project. In lieu of diverting existing public dollars, the Bears would simply be paying fewer dollars to the public.
As explained by Christopher Placek of the Arlington Daily Herald, the 376-page bill (which has grown from only 38 pages) is just one of the governmental incentives necessary to persuade the Bears to not cross the border.
However it goes, the clock is ticking on keeping the team from going to a different state. The Bears anticipate knowing whether Illinois will be able to put a deal together by early summer.
Regardless of whether Illinois does what the Bears want, it remains to be seen whether they'd actually move to Indiana. A recent Chicago Tribune poll found that only 38 percent of respondents would continue to support the Bears if they left Illinois, and that 15 percent would change allegiances to another team.
Of course, it's one thing to say it. It's another thing to do it. For most fans, sports teams are like family members. No matter what they do, they remain family members — and any threats to disown them end up being impossible to execute.
That said, it's far better for the Bears to be in Illinois. And, for now, it seems that the Indiana option is aimed solely at breaking the logjam in Illinois.
So far, it seems to be working.