CHICAGO — Local residents and business leaders who live near Guaranteed Rate Field expressed apprehension about the future, while Chicago White Sox executives travelled to Springfield Tuesday to make their pitch to state legislators.
According to multiple reports, White Sox owner Jerry Reinsdorf and other top club executives were scheduled to meet with legislators, including Illinois House Speaker Emanuel "Chris" Welch, to make the team and Related Midwest's pitch to bring a new baseball stadium to the South Loop area.
That pitch, rumored to request north of $1 billion in public funds to get off the ground.
“The payback is somewhere between absolutely nothing and extraordinarily little,” said Neil deMause, a freelance journalist who has contributed stadium building and baseball finance content for Baseball Prospectus for more than 20 years.
DeMause, like many locals, has expressed concerns over the economic viability of the stadium construction project, and cited 40 years of economic research on publicly-subsidized professional sports arenas and stadiums in conversations with WGN News.
"I think the scale of [the project] and the scale of the public subsidy is a bit of a surprise," deMause said.
Despite all of the proposed taxpayer benefits, deMause said the overwhelming consensus is that publicly-funded new stadiums don't create a new revenue stream for the city or state they reside in.
"Read the room Jerry, this is just not the time," said Illinois State Representative Kelly Cassidy in a phoner interview with WGN News. "A billionaire with plenty of means to make more money for himself, is asking us to buy him another stadium before we've even paid for the last one we built for him."
Carrie Stegmiller, manager of Turtles Bar & Grill in Bridgeport near Guaranteed Rate Field believes the team should stay put with their current stadium arrangement.
"This is where [the White Sox] belong," Stegmiller said. "This is their home and I think there’s a better way to do this.”
Stegmiller told WGN News that she and many other business leaders are wondering why the White Sox can't spruce up the area around the team's current stadium, instead of building a new one.
"I have a lot of concern because most of our business is in the summertime," Stegmiller said.
The proposal from the White Sox and real estate developer Related Midwest argue the stadium will spark a surge of economic development in "The 78" and surrounding South Side neighborhoods, bringing in billions of dollars in private development to the area.
In response to their meetings with the Illinois state legislature, the White Sox provided WGN News with the following statement Tuesday afternoon:
“We recognize discussions about The 78 serving as the future home of the Chicago White Sox have generated a lot of excitement over the potential of the larger project’s positive economic impact. We are mindful and respectful of the legislative process and wanted to travel to Springfield to meet personally with legislative leaders. We’re excited to share our vision, and we appreciate their time and hospitality.”
A Related Midwest Spokesperson also provided the following statement:
“We appreciated the time afforded to us by lawmakers in Springfield today. As we shared in the meetings, The 78 is a generational development and an investment in our hometown. It’s personal to us and we are excited about the prospect of delivering the city’s next great neighborhood, while making an historic economic investment that will bring over 10,000 construction jobs and 22,000 permanent jobs to our city and state. The long-term impact will be transformative – creating a new riverfront neighborhood anchored by a state-of-the-art ballpark for generations of fans to enjoy and help enhance Chicago’s place as a top destination.”