ABC7 Chicago is now streaming 24\/7. Click here to watch<\/a><\/p>\nGovernor Pritzker said the megaprojects legislation passed by the Illinois House is within the framework of a deal that the Bears would be willing to agree to for their new stadium.<\/p>\n
The team is considering proposed stadium sites in Arlington Heights and Hammond, Indiana.<\/p>\n
The Illinois bill passed the House last week, with 10 Republicans joining the Democratic supermajority in support. However, a few Democrats still oppose the measure.<\/p>\n
The plan requires the Bears and other developers of so-called megaprojects to negotiate with local governments over payments in lieu of higher property taxes based on updated assessments.<\/p>\n
Points of contention remain over a provision intended to give property tax relief to neighbors near a megaprojects site as well as the team wanting to ensure there’s no amusement tax provision.<\/p>\n
The governor said he wants a deal to get done as fast as possible.<\/p>\n
“We have to be competitive here,” Governor Pritzker said. “We want to make sure that the Bears see Illinois as the best alternative for them and that they have something that they can make a decision about that’s in front of them…So as fast as possible is what I’m advocating for. And I realize that the legislative person, I’ve been around the legislative process enough to know that it is sometimes difficult to wrangle there 177 members of the General Assembly.”<\/p>\n
The CEO of the Chicago Bears has said the team will have a decision on their new stadium plans by late spring, early summer.<\/p>\n
Indiana has already passed legislation for a Bears’ stadium project.<\/p>\n
Changes to the Illinois bill are expected as it now makes its way through the state senate. The spring legislative session ends May 31.<\/p>\n
Copyright \u00a9 2026 WLS-TV. All Rights Reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"SPRINGFIELD, Ill. (WLS) — The Chicago Bears leadership is expected to meet with the NFL this week about…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":761186,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[5124],"tags":[312811,11438,312807,252028,252027,252029,312810,89624,110831,312809,251929,960,531,208502,230771,312808,5386,1818],"class_list":["post-761185","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-chicago","tag-312811","tag-arlington-heights","tag-arlington-heights-bears-stadium-news","tag-arlington-heights-il","tag-arlington-heights-illinois","tag-arlington-heights-news","tag-bears-chicago","tag-bears-news","tag-bears-stadium","tag-bears-stadium-illinois-bill","tag-bears-stadium-news","tag-chicago","tag-chicago-bears","tag-chicago-bears-stadium","tag-chicago-bears-stadium-news","tag-chicago-bears-stadium-relocation-deadline","tag-il","tag-illinois"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/116487700553695418","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/761185","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=761185"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/761185\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/761186"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=761185"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=761185"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=761185"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}