New and renovated venues are planned.
National Football League training camps are open and the first pre-season game is near. It’s been a good off season for the Commissioner Roger Goodell and some of his owners. The Haslams in Cleveland, the Brown family in Cincinnati and Shad Khan in Jacksonville. Ohio lawmakers are ready to give money to the Haslams who want to build a stadium-village in Brook Park by 2029. Brook Park is about 15 miles from downtown Cleveland. In Cincinnati, Hamilton County lawmakers are ready to spend money to renovate the Bengals’ home field. Khan also got taxpayers’ dollars to fix up his Jacksonville venue.
Goodell still needs to put in the time as a lobbyist to get the owners of the Chicago Bears franchise a new stadium somewhere in the Chicago area. The Chicago Bears ownership has not been able to convince Illinois Governor JB Pritzker or Illinois lawmakers to free up money from taxpayers to help build a Bears venue in either Chicago or in the Chicago suburb of Arlington Heights. It’s wait until next year for the Bears franchise ownership in its quest for Illinois state funding for a stadium project. The legislature is done for 2025 and no state money is headed to the ownership. The McCaskey family’s Bears’ ownership group had hoped to break ground for a state-of-the-art 21st century venue by now. In May, the Bears’ ownership put out a statement indicating that it is all over for Chicago for now. “Over the last few months, we have made significant progress with the leaders in Arlington Heights, and look forward to continuing to work with state and local leaders on making a transformative economic development project for the region a reality.” Goodell is also monitoring the status of the potential construction of a Washington, D. C. stadium for Joel Harris’ Commanders franchise.
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