The Chicago White Sox owner wants a new ballpark.
Illinois Governor J. B. Pritzker remains unimpressed with Major League Baseball’s Chicago White Sox owner Jerry Reinsdorf’s desire to use public funds to help pay for a stadium-village that the 88-year-old owner is seeking. Pritzker said taxpayers’ money will not be used to fund a new stadium. Reinsdorf is looking to get his hands on an existing two percent hotel tax that is used to pay down the debt of his present stadium that was opened in 1991. A soon to be 34-year-old stadium in this day and age of sports venues is considered obsolete.
“A billion-dollar investment in a private business- for a private business, rather, that’s owned by wealthy people and is a highly-valued enterprise, it seems like the taxpayers, rightly, should say, ‘Don’t we have other uses for that capital?'” the governor asked. Pritzker is also dealing with three other Chicago sports teams owners, the National Football League’s McCaskey family, Major League Soccer’s Chicago Fire, Joe Mansueto, and the National Women’s Soccer League’ Chicago Red Stars owner, Laura Ricketts, who are looking for public money to build new venues for their businesses. Reinsdorf seems to be using an old playbook from the late 1980s when the White Sox owner pitted Chicago against St. Petersburg, Florida in the stadium game. Reinsdorf has visited Nashville to say hello to people there and allegedly in talks to sell the franchise to Dave Stewart who is part of a Nashville group. Ricketts is looking for a stadium and might want Pritzker’s help to partially fund a new venue. Ricketts’ business uses a Bridgeview, Illinois stadium that was built with taxpayers’ assistance for Major League Soccer’s Chicago Fire franchise and opened in 2006. That stadium is also antiquated. Mansueto’s team returned to Chicago in 2020.
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