Would a newly-filed bill eliminate any chance you’ll get soaked for a new White Sox ballpark?
Maybe not ... plus, results of last week’s poll
A bill filed in the Illinois House this week is aimed at making sports teams produce wins in order to be eligible to try to grab your money against your will. But there’s a strange little twist to it you may not have noticed ...
First, though, a word from our pollsters
When we included a poll in a piece last week, I had no idea if there would be any participation, but there turned out to be a lot more than I expected, and the results pretty much reinforce what your guess would probably be.
The first question was when those responding believe the White Sox will next be viable contenders. The possible answers were each year from 2025 to 2029, 2030+, and “one year after Jerry Reinsdorf dies.”
No surprise — the runaway choice was Reinsdorf heading off to that great tax haven in the sky, though the 40% it garnered seems modest. Perhaps some voters were dissuaded from that answer because it seemed a tad ghoulish.
As far as the individual years were concerned, fan optimism was evident, with the top year being 2027, with 21%. Less optimistic were the 14% who said 2030 or later, or the 12% at 2028. For true pie-in-the-sky wishful thinking, though, you have to hand it to the 1% who voted for 2025.
On another question, 81% predict the Sox will lose 100 or more games this season, with just over half of those reasonably optimistic and putting the losses in the 100-109 range and only the most dour 9% thinking the losses will total 120 or more. On the other end, only 4% think there will be fewer than 90 losses, which must include the 1% who somehow see a competitive team in 2025.
But on we go, to Springfield.
HB2969 brings a whole new point of view to billionaires ripping off taxpayers
The bill, filed this week by Deerfield Democrat Bob Morgan, carries the cumbersome title of the Balanced Earnings and Record Standards (BEARS) and Stadium Oversight and Expectations Act. Pro sports team owners may find it cumbersome indeed, because it makes them win games in order to be eligible for public funding, not just for stadium construction but for renovation and maintenance as well.
That may sound like some far-out fling for fun, but Morgan is no rowdy back-bencher. He has in the past served as an Assistant Majority Leader and party whip. So he has ties to state leadership, who may well have approved the message — and it may have a reasonable chance at passage.
Now, HB2969 is just a bill and hasn’t even made it to the Rules Committee to be assigned elsewhere yet, which means it’s highly unlikely ever to become law. But as a message it does put a new spin on things, and it would certainly do so if passed. Not with the state — both the governor and the legislature have made it clear to the Bears and White Sox there is no interest in Springfield in using tax money to fund the efforts of billionaires to build monuments to themselves. But the bill doesn’t say just funding by the state, it says “to be eligible for public financing,” which would certainly seem to apply to other jurisdictions as well. That’s an important wrinkle, lest Mayor Brandon Johnson decides his career is so far down the tubes he might as well blow a few billion bucks more of taxpayer money.
And what’s the new spin? To be eligible to be even considered for public funding a team “must have achieved a .500 record in at least three out of the last five regular seasons.” That leaves the Bears out as of right now, and the White Sox barely able to qualify.
Too bad for you and your gang of greedy, grasping multi-billionaires, and your plans for The 78, Jerry. Or is it?
Is there a giant White Sox loophole, at least for the moment?
Note the criterion HB2969 lists, “a .500 record in at least three of the last five regular seasons.” Yep, you see it — that makes the White Sox eligible to beg. — at least until the 2025 season is over, because they had winning seasons in 2020 and 2021 and went 81-81 in 2022. After this year, no way for a long, long time — but for the next few months, an out.
Is it suspicious? Maybe, even though Martin issued a release decrying any taxpayer money going to teams that don’t make an effort to be good.
It’s sure a lot more usual to say “a winning record” or “better than .500” than at least .500, which lets Reinsdorf and the covetous cabal sneak in for the nonce, so that could be shady. On the other hand, the bill actually specifies not a .500 but a “0.500” record, a format never used, so it could just have been written by someone who isn’t a sports fan, and with many steps to go through yet, that could be corrected in an amendment. There’s really no reason to think there’s anything shifty going on, but hey — this is Illinois.
Still, the wording is what it is, and Martin’s district covers southeast Lake County, which includes Highland Park, where Reinsdorf just happens to live. Is Martin tossing a nice juicy bone of a message to a very, very rich constituent? I find no record Reinsdorf has ever donated to a Martin campaign, but there are other ways to exert influence, so you never know.
Then there’s the question of what “public financing” is. Reinsdorf and fellow multi-billionaires Stephen M. Ross (head of the developer company and listed as worth $18.4 billion) and primary landowner and convicted fraudster (in France) Nadhmi Shakir Auchi have tried reaching into every possible pocket ... of others, not themselves. In addition to direct money in 10 figures, this group wants a billion or such for infrastructure (including a new Red Line Station at the stadium entrance even though there’s already one three blocks away), Tax Increment Financing (TIF) so they pay no property taxes, and to keep all the sales tax that’s generated in The 78.
I asked Google if a TIF is public financing, and the AI bot said yes, so maybe that would be banned under the bill. The sales tax thing? Who knows?
So there you have it — would HB2969, if passed and signed, keep Reinsdorf’s grasping paws out of your pockets? Or is it just telling him he better grab as much as he can, as fast as he can?
After all, the bill is called Balancing Earnings and Record Standards (BEARS), not Soaking Occupants Xtra (SOX).