In the summertime of 2019, because the Chicago Bears equipped for his or her a hundredth season, the staff’s prime officers needed to deal with a delicate off-field matter.
Citing safety considerations, Mayor Lori Lightfoot’s administration had requested “updating” her season tickets, which she’d held for years earlier than being elected months earlier to the highest job at Metropolis Corridor.
Lightfoot’s safety element anxious that she could be onerous to guard within the seats on the lakefront stadium’s 400 degree, so that they approached the Bears about shifting her to a unique location.
Workforce officers, together with President Ted Phillips, labored with Lightfoot’s representatives to attempt to accommodate their safety considerations and transfer the mayor’s seats — however the Bears had an issue of their very own. From the staff’s perspective, a 2016 ethics board ruling impressed by the Chicago Cubs’ World Sequence run difficult the query of whether or not they may supply the mayor a free and even face-value improve.
The town’s ethics board decided then that giving elected officers entry to face worth tickets for high-demand occasions constituted a “reward” underneath the town’s ethics ordinance, which prohibits them from taking something value greater than $50. Initially, the ethics board stated metropolis officers may obtain tickets in the event that they paid face worth for them. However the board later reversed itself, citing the truth that a daily member of the general public must pay $50 or extra above face worth for such tickets on the open market.
That call infuriated some members of Metropolis Council, although Southwest Aspect Ald. Matt O’Shea ripped his colleagues. “Buy your own damn tickets,” he stated on the time.
Lightfoot’s 2019 transfer to alter her Soldier Subject seats led to months of discussions between the Bears and metropolis officers. Ultimately, Lightfoot didn’t obtain the improve she sought and stored her season tickets as is.
The Bears declined to remark. Lightfoot’s workplace didn’t handle questions concerning the mayor’s effort to maneuver her season tickets.
“It’s well-established that Mayor Lightfoot is a die-hard Bears fan and a longtime season ticket holder within the 400 part of Soldier Subject. Her seats haven’t modified in at the very least 10 years and so they have remained the identical throughout her tenure as mayor,” the mayor’s workplace stated in a press release launched by press secretary Cesar Rodriguez. “Go Bears.”
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Metropolis emails launched in response to Tribune public document requests present how prime Lightfoot officers communicated with the NFL staff over the matter.
On Aug. 1, 2019, NFL Affiliate Safety Consultant Tina Sherrow Bayless emailed the mayor’s head of safety, Jim Smith, to introduce him to Courtenae Trautmann, one other NFL safety consultant, saying “we anticipate Mayor Lightfoot’s attendance on the Bears’ video games this season.”
“Jim, many thanks once more for taking my name right this moment and the productive dialog. I’m assured that we’ll have a collaborative and profitable partnership shifting ahead and we look ahead to working with you and your staff,” Sherrow Bayless wrote. “You probably have any questions, want extra info, or help with facilitating something on the stadium and/or upcoming occasions, please attain out to us at anytime.”
Smith thanked her for the response and famous, “We’re presently within the technique of hopefully updating the mayor’s seats, not fairly certain at this level the place they are going to be however will advise as soon as we all know.”
Trautmann responded, “We’re trying ahead to a a lot much less confrontational expertise with you and your staff ;). No matter we are able to do to facilitate the mayor’s time at SF, please tell us!”
Writing again, Smith assured her “there might be no additional points on our aspect of the ball.”
“Something you want from CPD say the phrase, I occur to have a good friend with some clout ;)” Smith wrote. “I look ahead to sitting down.”
Phillips, the Bears president, emailed Smith the subsequent day providing totally different potential ticket choices, “per seat, per yr.” Smith forwarded that e-mail to Lightfoot’s government assistant.
A Bears government assistant emailed Smith on Aug. 8 to comply with up.
“It’s my understanding that you just and (Bears government) Lee Twarling have been involved relating to season tickets,” the assistant wrote. “I needed to comply with up with you to see you probably have any extra questions or if any choices have been made relating to the choices you and he have mentioned? You might contact both of us.”
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Data present the dialog over tickets continued into the autumn and officers mentioned the ethics ruling as a key hurdle.
In October, as an illustration, Lightfoot’s senior ethics adviser Celia Meza emailed Roger Bickel, an lawyer with the Bears, to ask if they may have “a follow-up dialog relating to the town’s ethics advisory opinion.”
Later that month, Bears Common Counsel Cliff Stein emailed Meza to thank her for a sequence of conversations that they had “as each counsel search to interpret the Board of Ethics steering as it might relate to addressing the mayor’s safety issues.”
“Per our dialog I’m enclosing three choices beneath of the discretionary ticket areas and face worth worth listing. As mentioned, this isn’t a season-ticket holder account, which includes the acquisition of a everlasting seat license (PSL), however relatively an government discretionary account for the season that the membership makes use of for enterprise functions in its sole discretion,” Stein wrote.
“On condition that these tickets are usually not usually accessible to the general public prematurely and are being offered at face worth, we would wish written affirmation from the Board of Ethics {that a} hypothetical sale complies with the present ethics opinions and steering making an allowance for any security and safety considerations within the stadium,” Stein wrote.
These tickets lined the final six video games of the 2019 season. The seats had been supplied for $1,992 for pairs within the 300 degree, $3,732 within the 200 degree, and $2,248 for pairs within the 100 degree.
Ultimately, Lightfoot stored her seats on the 400 degree, although it isn’t clear why she and her staff dropped their request. Steve Berlin, ethics board government director, stated he “can’t touch upon any particular reality scenario, or whether or not the board was concerned, and in that case, what the board suggested or to whom — that’s all confidential by legislation.”
The 2019 season was adopted by pandemic-altered 2020, the place followers weren’t allowed within the stadium.
Though Lightfoot is a lifelong soccer fan and a Bears devotee, her administration has had a rocky relationship with the staff. The mayor’s preliminary response when the Bears expressed curiosity in constructing a stadium in Arlington Heights was to name it “noise” and urge the Bears to concentrate on “being related previous October.”
Since then, Lightfoot has floated the potential for constructing a expensive dome over Soldier Subject and appointed a job drive to look at the Museum Campus that’s house to the stadium, strikes that had been geared toward mitigating the political fallout if the staff leaves Chicago.
