reprinted from:
By
Fran Spielman Chicago aldermen already had
their noses out of joint about not being shown the glitzy model of the new
Soldier Field. Now Mayor Daley has pledged city tax dollars to back up
stadium bonds without even consulting them. "That was just a
fallback that, truthfully, the Republicans wanted," Daley said
Thursday as the General Assembly was ending the long-running Bears stadium
saga. "We were very
conservative in protecting the taxpayers' money. That money is there. Our
hotel business dealing with conventions and tourists is very, very strong.
In the last 10 years, it keeps growing tremendously. We're very confident
in our forecasts dealing with the hotel tax. We're fully protected on it.
And if not, we're going to be repaid." Soldier Field bonds
will be retired by the same 2 percent increase in Chicago's hotel tax that
financed Comiskey Park. The state got involved because it needed to
authorize the Illinois Sports Facilities Authority to issue $ 387 million
in bonds that will be paid by surplus revenues from the hotel tax. The financing scheme
assumes the tax will continue to grow at an annual rate of 5 percent. If those projections
prove too rosy, or if the cyclical hotel business takes a dive, Daley has
agreed to make up the difference by allowing the state to withhold a
portion of the city's share of state income tax. The question floating
around City Hall is whether the city tax commitment needs City Council
approval. "I don't know.
I'll find out. I don't have the answer," the mayor said. A City Hall source
close to the stadium negotiations insisted City Council approval was not
required. "The City Council
didn't put the state income tax into effect. They have no right to
allocate it. The Illinois Legislature decides the city's share," the
source said. Finance Committee
Chairman Edward M. Burke (14th), the council's resident expert on legal
matters, could not be reached for comment on the tax question. Ald. William Beavers
(7th) said he plans to extract his pound of flesh when the stadium project
comes up for zoning approval, whether or not aldermen are bypassed on the
tax question. "I see a number of
opportunities for minorities to participate in the concessions at Soldier
Field, and I want to make sure we get our fair share," Beavers said. "I don't have any
problem with him pledging city money if I'm able to get something out of
it. If I don't, I'll have to do something else. He still has to come
before the City Council." If Daley can pledge
city tax dollars to backstop a Bears stadium, CTA riders may demand to
know why the city can't scrape up the money to reverse CTA service cuts by
increasing an annual contribution to the transit agency that has been
frozen at $ 3 million since the 1970s, said Ald. Freddrenna Lyle (6th). "Clearly, they
would be concerned that we do have our priorities misplaced," Lyle
said. Jacqueline Leavy,
executive director of the Neighborhood Capital Budget Group, a taxpayer
watchdog group, questioned the "back-door dealings" that allowed
Daley to pull his legislative end run around the City Council. "The City Council
has not been consulted, taxpayers are being left in the dark about what
the impact is going to be on the city's financial situation and what the
trade-offs will be if those monies are pledged to back this deal,"
Leavy said. "If there is wiggle room for the city to make strategic
investments (in a football stadium), then certainly increasing the city's
financial support to the CTA is paramount. We still have vast areas of our
neighborhoods that are underserved as a result of the last service
cuts." |
