Through 17 months of battles since a remarkably unattractive redesign for Soldier Field was unveiled, both supporters and opponents of the plan have been able to agree on only one thing: The financing package behind the stadium deal left little margin for error.
If everything were to break just right for the Chicago Bears and the City of Chicago, there would be enough money to pay for the supposed $606 million project without sticking Chicago taxpayers with the tab.
But in ways small and not so small, numbers keep changing. And as they change, the possibility that in the end they won’t add up properly is rising. As an article in Sunday’s Tribune reported: “[An] analysis of the $632 million project shows that the public bill for the stadium renovation is higher than city officials have said it would be while benefits to taxpayers–in terms of promised parkland and additional park revenues–fall short of what was promised.”
Keen minds will notice that in the space of only one paragraph, the cost of the project jumped by a previously undisclosed $26 million. That’s because proponents had undersold the total cost, yet were stuck with a limit set by Illinois legislators on the value of bonds they could sell to finance the deal.
By toying with interest rates to get premium prices from bond buyers, the Illinois Sports Facilities Authority wound up with $26 million more in its mitts than the legislature intended. Neat trick–except that many more millions will now be needed to repay that extra debt.
Then there’s the promised $10-million-plus that the Chicago Park District would receive each year from the deal. Turns out that number was inflated. The real number–unless you want to engage in some truly loopy machinations–will be either lower or much lower: The Park District will earn less in 2004, the scheduled first full year of the new stadium’s operation, than it has in the past.
And let’s not forget the oft-repeated boast of stadium backers that the tax money involved comes from a Chicago hotel tax levied by the Illinois Sports Facilities Authority. How great is that! Vacationers from Hoboken will pay the public freight for a football stadium in Chicago!
Except that the scheme relies on ever-rising hotel tax revenues. Principal and interest payments total $6.3 million in 2002, yet rise to $88.5 million in 2032. If for any reason the hotel tax can’t pay its share, Chicago taxpayers are squarely on the hook.
Bottom line: At a time when new, big-city stadiums are growing less reliant on public money, Chicago is pouring the most dollars of any National Football League city into a project that will cost more than $10,000 per seat. With no public referendum to let voters speak. And, of course, with the usual pinstripe patronage lucre for politically connected bond firms and contractors who famously contribute campaign money to Mayor Richard Daley.
Separately, a Cook County judge on Thursday will consider a lawsuit alleging that the Soldier Field project involves an illegal use of public assets to benefit a private company. Make that lots of public assets.
