{"id":744443,"date":"2026-02-11T09:14:21","date_gmt":"2026-02-11T09:14:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/744443\/"},"modified":"2026-02-11T09:14:21","modified_gmt":"2026-02-11T09:14:21","slug":"portage-indiana-mayor-pitches-proposal-for-new-bears-stadium-site","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/744443\/","title":{"rendered":"Portage, Indiana, mayor pitches proposal for new Bears stadium site"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Arlington Heights and towns in Northwest Indiana are upping their game for a stadium deal with the Chicago Bears.<\/p>\n<p>While the team&#8217;s season is over, the renewed push for a new stadium is in playoff mode, with more cities throwing their hats and money at the team to come to their community. <\/p>\n<p>Three years after the Bears purchased the old <a href=\"https:\/\/www.cbsnews.com\/chicago\/news\/new-renderings-possible-chicago-bears-stadium-arlington-heights\/\" target=\"_blank\" data-invalid-url-rewritten-http=\"\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">Arlington Heights race track<\/a>, the deal to bring the team to the northwest suburb has yet to be finalized. <\/p>\n<p>&#8220;The Bears do not have property tax certainty. They will not be able to finance the stadium,&#8221; said Marc Ganis.<\/p>\n<p>Ganis specializes in high-level sports transactions. He said that is what&#8217;s holding up the deal in Illinois. <\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Lenders are not going to lend them money, knowing that their property tax bill could become astronomical from one year to the next,&#8221; he said.<\/p>\n<p>Ganis says Arlington Heights remains the only viable option in Illinois. But just across the border in <a href=\"https:\/\/www.cbsnews.com\/chicago\/news\/bears-1995-proposal-move-suburbs-gary-mayor-richard-m-daley\/\" target=\"_blank\" data-invalid-url-rewritten-http=\"\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">Gary<\/a> and the city of Portage are showing true interest in the team. <\/p>\n<p>&#8220;This is about having the same roar at a new shore,&#8221; said Portage, Indiana, Mayor Austin Bonta.<\/p>\n<p>Just 40 miles from Soldier Field, Bonta is ready to give the Bears 300 acres of land for free. <\/p>\n<p>&#8220;We also have a partner who&#8217;s able to offer a financial deal to finance the stadium so that they&#8217;ll be able to utilize it rent-free at no cost to taxpayers and no cost to the Bears,&#8221; he said.<\/p>\n<p>Portage is calling it Hallas Harbor. The city recently made its pitch video to the Bears. <\/p>\n<p>Indiana legislatures are working on a possible offer that would pave the way for a multibillion-dollar, publicly owned stadium at no cost to the team.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;I never take anything as if it&#8217;s a bluff. I&#8217;m always concerned,&#8221; Gov. JB Pritzker said.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Indiana is moving aggressively,&#8221; Ganis said.<\/p>\n<p>The city of Gary is offering the Bears three different proposed sites to build on, touting Gary&#8217;s access to the rails, highway, and its airport. It would revitalize the former Steel City.<\/p>\n<p>And if the Bears choose Illinois, Ganis said the organization would walk away from a lot of money. <\/p>\n<p>&#8220;And they would be loyal to the fans, they would be loyal to the history of the team being in Illinois, and they should get a lot of credit,&#8221; he said.  <\/p>\n<p>Ganis expects a decision and deal to be reached within weeks.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>He says Illinois needs to move fast because Indiana lawmakers take a break at the end of the month, and the Hoosier State is pushing to get this done before then.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\n          More from CBS News\n        <\/p>\n<p class=\"content__tags__label\">In:<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Arlington Heights and towns in Northwest Indiana are upping their game for a stadium deal with the Chicago&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":744444,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2070],"tags":[10654,374,692,391,2493,7,932,6,10661],"class_list":{"0":"post-744443","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-chicago-bears","8":"tag-arlington-heights","9":"tag-bears","10":"tag-chicago","11":"tag-chicago-bears","12":"tag-chicagobears","13":"tag-football","14":"tag-indiana","15":"tag-nfl","16":"tag-soldier-field"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nfl\/116051238173483086","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/744443","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=744443"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/744443\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/744444"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=744443"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=744443"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=744443"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}