This column originally ran in the baiduhai on Dec. 30, 1986.
It’s become an accepted fact that we will have a terrible civic disaster if the Bears moved to the suburbs. Everybody says so — the mayor, his allies, his opponents, business leaders, and even talk-show hosts.
But would it really be a big deal? Would it truly affect the lives of most Chicagoans? Or even one Chicagoan?
Consider that between 1974 and 1984, Chicago lost about 200,000 jobs.
Some of them simply ceased to exist when businesses folded or new technology eliminated workers.
But many of them are gone because businesses moved, either to the suburbs or other parts of the country.
There wasn’t nearly as loud a cry of anguish about the loss of those jobs — and the impact on the city’s tax base — as there is when the Bears rich owners threaten to move to Arlington Heights or some such town if Chicago doesn’t make them richer.
But what are we really talking about? We’re talking about no more than ten football games a year. Even with ushers, beer vendors and the people who vacuum the plastic field, the labor force at a football game doesn’t exactly compare with that of a steel mill.
And the taxes generated by the ticket sales is a pittance compared to the taxes that were lost when less glamorous businesses packed up and moved — without City Hall breaking a sweat to keep them here.
Yet, the thought of the Bears moving has City Hall taking part in a scheme to give the Bears franchise free park land so that it can build a new stadium.
Despite what the mayor’s flunkies are saying, it’s almost certain that a new stadium — even one built through private financing — would require massive highway work. The taxpayers would have to pick up the $50 million tab for that.
And nobody has yet explained who will pay off the long-term bonds that were sold to renovate Soldier Field so the Bears could play there. The debt is something like $6 million a year until the year 2000.
If a new stadium is built, it means that the Bears will have to be freed from their Soldier Field lease, which runs to the year 2000.
Does that mean that the Bears will go on paying their half of the $6 million a year? I haven’t heard Mayor Harold Washington or the McCaskey family say anything about that.
But somebody will have to pay. Guess who that might be? A hint: $6 million a year amounts to the property taxes paid by about 4,000 average bungalow owners.
Now that’s what I would call a civic disaster.
And for what? To keep the earth from shaking and the sky from darkening because the Bears might move to a stadium in a suburb.
If you think about it, a football stadium is nothing more than a big, outdoor television studio.
Even with a big, new stadium, about 99 percent of all the millions of people who live in the greater Chicago area will never go to a Bears game. They’ll watch the games on TV.
Will the chosen few who have season tickets care if the games are played in the suburbs? Probably not, since most of them live in the suburbs.
Will the players care? Of course not. They can bash each other anywhere, and they live in the suburbs, too.
That leaves the TV fans. Sitting in their living rooms, they won’t be able to tell whether the game is being played on the shores of Lake Michigan or somewhere near Ill. Hwy. 53.
So I say, let them move. If we’re going to worry about giving someone a new home, it shouldn’t be a home for a football team. Not while there are truly homeless people in this city.
Besides, it’s a big bluff. The McCaskeys won’t really move. If they did, they’d have to buy expensive suburban real estate for their new playground. And pay for the land and stadium out of their own pockets. Not those nickel biters.
I’m sure the mayor knows it’s a bluff. As a lawyer, he ought to understand that when the Bears signed that long-term lease for Soldier Field, they obligated themselves to pay. And if they move, they’ll wind up being sued like any other deadbeat.
But the mayor is going along with the bluff because he thinks it will get him votes. As election day approaches, he will be able to thump himself on the chest and say: “I have expeditiously and innovatively deflected the burgeoning — and I mean burrrrgeeeeoniiiing — threat of our beloved Bears wandering into that vast wilderness known to pilgrims as The Suburbs.”
He’s convinced that because the fans love Mongo, the Fridge, Samurai Mike and Sweetness, they’ll love Happy Harold, too, if he builds a new stadium.
But a new stadium won’t be for the players. It will be for the owners of the franchise, who think more about the bottom line than about any goal line. And most people–at least those who pay taxes–are sharp enough to recognize that.
So what the mayor is dancing isn’t the Super Bowl Shuffle. It’s more like the Chicago Hustle.
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