Chicago Bears, City Could Resume Stadium Talks: Report

CHICAGO — Just days after the Chicago Bears indicated that the former Arlington Park Racecourse venue is no longer the team’s singular focus for the site of a new stadium, the City of Chicago may again be in play, according to a published report.

Talks between the Bears and city officials could resume soon and possibly as early as this week, WTTW reported on Monday night. The report was published just three days after Bears officials met with officials in Naperville, which is seeking to possibly become the team's new home should the Bears abandon Chicago's Lakefront.

Demolition began last week at Arlington Park, where the Bears closed on a $197.2 million property agreement earlier this year. For months, the team said that Arlington Heights was the lone target of the Bears to build a new stadium. However, new Bears President Kevin Warren met with Naperville’s mayor on Friday, a week after Mayor Scott Wehrli reached out to the Bears and extended an invitation to meet to consider moving the team there.

Arlington Heights Mayor Thomas Hayes issued a statement on Friday saying that the village always expected the Bears to keep all of its options open as part of doing its due diligence. In an email to Patch on Friday, Hayes said that he still believes Arlington Heights is the team’s best option and that he hopes the Bears will call the village home for the next 50 years or more.

The WTTW report also indicated that Rockford could make a push to get in on the Bears’ apparent change of heart to consider other locations for a new stadium besides Arlington Heights.

In an email from Patch on Tuesday seeking comment on possible conversations reopening with Chicago city officials, including Mayor Brandon Johnson, Scott Hagel — the team’s vice president of marketing and communications — wrote, “Nothing new to report.”

The Bears said in their statement late last week that demolition at Arlington Park will continue. The team indicated that the team’s goal of building the largest single development project in Illinois history in Arlington Heights is “at risk.”

At issue, the team said, is that the stadium-based project remains "broadly popular" in Arlington Heights, the greater Chicago area and across Illinois. But the statement said that the Arlington Park original assessment at five times the 2021 tax value and the recent settlement with Churchill Downs for 2022 being three times higher "fails to reflect the property is not operational and not commercially viable in its current state."

A message seeking comment from Johnson’s office was not immediately returned to Patch on Tuesday morning.

Discussions between the city and the Bears have not taken place since the team made it clear that it was only considering Arlington Heights as a possible landing spot for the team.

That was the case even after former Mayor Lori Lightfoot and other city officials introduced plans for a re-imagined Soldier Field that included building a roof on the Bears’ current home and included a price tag of $2.2 billion. Lightfoot said that revamping Soldier Field would be cheaper than building from scratch in Arlington Heights.

The Bears have not introduced designs for a stadium itself but said that the price for developing all of the 326-acre plot of the former racecourse could take up to 10 years and have characterized the project as a “multi-billion” venture.