A third state would like to enter the battle for the next home of the Chicago Bears.
Iowa Gov. Kim Reynolds voiced an interest in luring the NFL team on Wednesday, according to the Des Moines Register, calling the idea a “wild pass.” A day later, an Iowa Senate subcommittee advanced Senate File 2252.
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If passed, the bill would modify Iowa’s major economic growth attraction program to “include incentivizing the building of a professional sports stadium by a National Football League franchise in the state.”
The Bears do not appear to have publicly reacted to the move.
Iowa’s interest is the latest development in the Bears’ quest to find a post-Soldier Field home. The Bears have floated both a lakefront site near Soldier Field and a development in the suburb of Arlington Heights, both of which would require more than a billion dollars in taxpayer support. The Illinois legislature reportedly declined either project for 2026, leading team president Kevin Warren to float a move to northwest Indiana.
Indiana politicians have moved to meet that interest. The cities of Gary, Hammond and Portage — NW Indiana’s three largest cities — have all signaled interest in the Bears.
What will be the next state to signal an interest in the Bears? (Photo by Kara Durrette/Getty Images)
(Kara Durrette via Getty Images)
An Iowa state senator had an interesting way to describe the situation, via Front Office Sports:
Sen. Kerry Gruenhagen (R., Iowa), in a statement, said the bill was filed to “show a team in our neighboring state that we are ready for them if their home state doesn’t want them. While Illinois and Indiana squabble over this issue, we are ready to get off the sidelines and into the game.”
Not every Iowa politician is interested in the enormous expenditure that landing the Bears would require, though. Iowa House minority leader Brian Meyer told the Register he didn’t see the idea as serious:
“It’s all a game, it’s all a gimmick,” Meyer said. “I get it. I understand. But the time to get serious is upon us and we need to focus on issues that really matter to people. And I understand, obviously there is no way the Chicago Bears are moving to wherever they want them to, right? So the reality is we’re not going to annex Galena, Illinois, either. So let’s get serious. We need to buckle down and focus on school funding, clean up the waterways and make life more affordable.”
There are obvious challenges to bringing the Bears to Iowa that not even Indiana would really face. For starters, there’s the question of how far you can move from Chicago and still call yourself the Chicago Bears. One could argue that moving to Indiana would break that threshold, but northwest Indiana is still considered part of the Chicago metropolitan area by the U.S. Census.
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It’s roughly a 40-mile drive from Soldier Field to Portage, the farthest city of the Indiana trio. The Iowa border, meanwhile, is more than 150 miles. So moving the Bears would mean severing generations of local connections for a state with about a third of the population of the Chicago metro area.
You would hope that’s a factor in the Bears’ eventual decision.