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The Bears reiterated Thursday that they plan to leave Chicago while continuing to consider building a stadium in suburban Illinois or Hammond, Indiana.
“The Chicago Bears have exhausted every opportunity to remain in Chicago, which was our initial goal,” the team said in a statement. “There is no viable site in the city. As a result, the only sites under consideration are in Arlington Heights and Hammond.”
The statement, which appears to again close the door on staying in Chicago, comes after team president Kevin Warren said last month at the NFL meetings in Arizona that the Bears hoped to choose a new site for a closed stadium in Illinois or Indiana later this spring or early summer.
The Bears have played at Soldier Field for more than half a century. Indiana lawmakers are trying to lure them from the Windy City with a plan to finance and build a domed stadium in Hammond, about 25 miles from their current home on the shore of Lake Michigan.
The Illinois General Assembly responded with legislation that would give tax breaks to so-called megaprojects of at least $100 million, a plan that would encompass the Bears’ proposal to build a complex on a 326-acre parcel of land they own in Arlington Heights.
“Both sites are excellent,” Warren said last month.
The Bears are an NFL franchise that has played in Illinois since the team’s founding in 1920 as the Decatur Staleys. Since moving to Chicago in 1921, the Bears have never owned their stadium, either playing at Wrigley Field from 1921 to 1970 or at Soldier Field since.
Associated Press information.
