Arlington Heights village staff is expected to walk village trustees through a pre-development agreement related to a proposed Chicago Bears stadium Monday night, which would provide a road map for the NFL football team’s possible arrival in the village.
The Village Board will be meeting as the Committee of the Whole where trustees will hear and discuss information but make no binding votes or commitments, officials explained.
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The draft agreement staff will present lays out general terms for how Arlington Heights and the Bears could work together on the Bears’ proposed stadium and mixed-use commercial and residential development on the site of the now-shuttered Arlington Park International Racecourse, according to details of the agreement included with the meeting agenda.
In a memo accompanying the proposed agreement, staff from the village manager’s office state that part of the rationale for drafting and discussing such a document is “to provide the [Bears] some assurances regarding our intentions and predictability of process so that they can make a purchasing decision later in 2022″ and to lay out Arlington heights’ expectations of the team in the event the development moves forward.
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“This agreement is about establishing and publicly stating intent, not creating irrevocable commitments. Given the early stage of the project, Staff and the Chicago Bears believe it is too early to establish such commitments. However, we both agree that it is important that all stakeholders understand the intent and goals of the Village and the Chicago Bears. The Agreement acknowledges that the Village will need much more information in order to weigh in on their proposal in a formal way, but that the Village is willing to explore the general idea of an NFL Stadium and mixed-use development on the site,” village staff state in the memo.
The proposed agreement lists hotels, retail and commercial establishments, a fitness center, a sports betting facility, a hall of fame, performance space, restaurants and residential amenities as potential components of the mixed-use development the Bears could look to build with the stadium, projected to bill around $5 billion
The document indicates that the current structures at the racecourse will need to be demolished in order to make way for the proposed stadium and amenities.
And for the first time, the document details possible options in the village’s public financing toolkit to bring the team to Arlington Heights, including, “tax increment financing; special service areas; special assessments” and more.
However, the drafted agreement still stresses the early phase of the process.
One of the most-discussed elements of the Bears’ potential move to Arlington Heights has been whether taxpayers will foot some of the bill to bring them there.
That question has generated a petition for an ordinance that would bar the village from offering tax incentives to any business looking to open there and a poll that found village residents favor the stadium being built but oppose the use of public money in that development. Both initiatives have come from the libertarian, Koch brothers-backed political advocacy group Americans for Prosperity.
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The pre-development agreement states that the village is aware that the Bears intend to request public funding to pay for the infrastructure costs of the mixed-use development, among other possible line items.
Mayor Thomas Hayes has so far said that he would only support the use of taxpayer dollars for the Bears’ development as a “last resort.”
The agreement that village staff and the Committee of the Whole will discuss Monday night sets out conditions under which the village might provide public money for the project: namely, “only to the extent justified by economic and fiscal analyses conducted by the Village and/or competent consultants regarding the Project,” it states.
The proposed agreement references a number of analyses the village will need to conduct before authorizing the project to move forward — should the land purchase deal go through — including a parking and traffic analysis, an economic impact study and an infrastructure analysis.
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Last month, the Village Board approved a set of contracts with traffic and economic consultants to begin studying how the Bears stadium and development might impact the village, with the Bears expected to reimburse the village for the study costs.
If the Bears do finalize the $197.2 million purchase of the former racecourse, the village will need to amend its 2015 Comprehensive Plan, according to the pre-development agreement.
The Bears publicly presented renderings and an open letter stating their intentions for the 326-acre site last month. About 700 residents of the village and surrounding suburbs attended the forum at John Hersey High School.
Residents who came out to hear the plans said they were excited by the prospect of having the Bears in the area but worried about the tax impact on their own families as well as parking and traffic issues.
After discussing the pre-development agreement at the Committee of the Whole meeting, village trustees could formally vote on the plan at or before the regular Nov. 7 board meeting.
