Bears want more after Illinois House passes megaproject tax incentive
bill
[April 24, 2026]
By Jon Styf | The Center Square
(The Center Square) – The Illinois House of Representatives passed a
megaproject bill that would set up the Chicago Bears for a hefty
property tax break on a new stadium and development in Arlington Heights
but that didn’t stop the team from immediately asking for more.
“Additional amendments are necessary to make the Arlington Heights site
feasible for our stadium project,” the Bears said in a statement. “We
support Illinois leaders as they determine the path forward to making
the essential changes to the mega project bill and aligning on
infrastructure funding."
While the deal does not include direct funding for the Bears’ stadium,
the team has asked for $887 million from the state to spend on
infrastructure for the estimated $5 billion project on the former
Arlington Park race course.
The megaproject bill would freeze property taxes at their current level
on the property and add a negotiated special payment beyond that,
something that Americans For Prosperity Illinois Deputy State Director
Brian Costin could give the Bears up to $350 million in tax breaks each
year over what another business would pay, leading Costin to call the
bill the “most terrifying bill I’ve seen in my 20 year professional
career.”
The bill extends far beyond the Bears’ project, including benefits for a
proposed $30 billion One Central rail project near Soldier Field to
connect Metra, Amtrak and the Chicago Transit Authority trains in one
spot along with building high-rise residences.
“This is enormously dangerous for people in Illinois who happen to live
near the projects,” Costin told The Center Square.
The megaproject bill saw renewed urgency in recent months as the Bears
claimed to be pursuing a potential stadium near Wolf Lake in Hammond,
Indiana.
Leading economist J.C. Bradbury of Georgia’s Kennesaw State University
has studied the finances of publicly funded stadiums and is the author
of an upcoming book titled ‘This One Will Be Different: False Promises
and Fiscal Realities of Publicly Funded Stadiums.’
“Economists have been studying public stadiums for about five decades
and there has not been one instance that I am aware of in which the
stadium has actually paid for itself, that it has generated enough money
to pay back taxpayers,” Bradbury told The Center Square. “This isn’t an
investment, it’s a subsidy.”
Bradbury noted that a Bears move to Indiana would be positive to
Illinois taxpayers if they could drive over the stateline to see the
team play while Indiana taxpayers subsidized a new stadium.
“You often see these phony threats that ‘We’re gonna move’ and it’s very
clear that the Bears do not want to move and that’s why they keep
threatening to move and, when they get an offer and then they don’t
move, it makes it clear that it’s not very credible,” Bradbury said. “I
do understand that the Bears might end up making a decision and decide
that the situation in Indiana is better than what they have at Soldier
Field … but I think there’s going to be some backlash from fans and I
don’t think it’s going to be good financially for them and I think
that’s why they don’t want to do it.”
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Illinois state Rep. Kam Buckner, D-Chicago, speaks during an
interview. Photo: Greg Bishop / The Center Square
Neil deMause, co-author of the book ‘Field of Schemes’ and author of
a blog with the same name, said the Bears made Jerry Reinsdorf proud
after Reinsdorf famously threatened to move the Chicago White Sox
out of Chicago to St. Petersburg, Florida, in the late 1980s before
later admitting he was never actually intending to move the team.
He pointed out that it isn’t completely clear how large of a tax
benefit the Bears are set to receive in Arlington Heights because
the development plan and what could be included in the area impacted
by the megaproject property tax break is not yet defined.
The Bears’ initial plans included residential buildings on the
former race course but those residential areas cannot be included in
the defined megaproject area. It’s also unclear what would be
defined as infrastructure that the state and local governments would
pay for and what the Bears would fund at the site.
“We don’t know exactly how much it’s worth,” deMause told The Center
Square. “It could be $2 billion, it could be less. The Bears are
saying they still want state infrastructure money and we don’t know
how much that is, so it could be anywhere in the billion, $2 billion
or $3 billion range. None of those would be a record but any of
those would have been a record a year or two ago before we had the
Commanders deal.”
deMause called the Bears’ Wednesday night request for more subsidy
“their one chance to leverage that Indiana threat.”
“I guess the lesson from past deals is, you can’t get if you don’t
ask,” deMause said. “So you may as well demand everything and then
see what happens.”
If the Bears don’t receive their full demands, then the team will
have a choice whether to follow through on the threat to move to
Indiana or not, he noted.
The bill also included a caveat where officials involved in the
deals cannot receive free or reduced priced tickets at a venue that
receives property tax breaks through the megaproject bill and
officials cannot leave to work for a company that benefits from the
property tax breaks within a year of a megaproject agreement being
finalized.
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