How Nice of Them

I'm supposed to root for a team that would dare do this? Let’s just say it’s hard. The Bears want a state law that will allow them to negotiate their tax bill with the relevant public bodies in and around their hoped-for new Arlington Heights Stadium. To move things along, the team offered to make a one-time,$25 million payment to the city of Chicago. Why? Because in McCaskeyland, that qualifies as a principled act. The Munsters think that the $534 million in outstanding bonds from the 2003 renovation of Soldier Field isn’t their concern; they’re just tenants. But, out of the goodness of their hearts, they offered the money “to rebuild or improve public parks and playing fields each year in under resourced Chicago neighborhoods,” according to a letter the Bears circulated to Chicago Democrats in the General Assembly. [story in today’s Sunb-Times] The mind boggles here. The team says that costs go up every month the project is delayed, yet they have $25 million on hand to buy votes. And they still want close to $1 billion in infrastructure assistance. How will they sweeten that ask?