A lot can change in two weeks – but how much can happen in six business days?
Oct. 6 was my most recent column about Lake Forest’s pro football team searching for its forever home, including a prediction that the November veto session will conclude with a legislative plan in place. Since then, some details have emerged, and while the next two weeks probably won’t be too newsworthy on that front because of the Nov. 3 general election, the stage is clearly set for six important days in the next two months.
The fall veto session runs Nov. 17-19 and Dec. 1-3. Unlike the wonky spring term schedule where the House and Senate seemed to be staggered so there were never too many lawmakers in Springfield at any one time, these six session days – allowing for the possibility that election results impact a few personal priorities – should have as many folks as possible present.
As Capitol Fax’s Isabel Miller reported Friday, Gov. JB Pritzker expressed optimism about getting deals done for a Bears stadium bill as well as data center regulation. The latter issue certainly will have far more significant influence on the daily lives of the majority of Illinoisans, but it comes up in this context to examine how things work at the Statehouse.
Pritzker has a pretty good (although not flawless) track record of tempering expectations. He wouldn’t be discussing either a stadium proposal or data centers without reasonable confidence of resolving those issues. It’s always fair to question whether a politician’s “we’ll have something great after the election” is baseless bluster, but polling indicates it’s unlikely the coming vote turns on either issue.
What’s far more likely is the notion that if Pritzker is genuinely concocting a presidential bid – against my sage advice, of course – he’s at least smart enough to avoid over-promising and under-delivering while his party controls all state government levers. That likelihood echoes in his concurrent prognostication that another priority, his Building Up Illinois Developments housing shortage strategy, won’t be viable until at least January’s lame duck session.
So what will happen for the Bears? The present plan seems to be lawmakers putting the choice in the team’s hands by establishing equal conditions for staying in the city and moving to the former racetrack land it already owns in Arlington Heights. This allows the General Assembly to say it put an offer on the table, lets Chicago Democrats claim they didn’t explicitly vote to let the team leave the city, and ultimately calls the franchise’s barely veiled bluff about jumping to Indiana, a plan the NFL clearly opposes.
Whether those six days can involve fully protecting taxpayer interests remains unclear, but the goal line is rapidly approaching.
• Scott T. Holland writes about state government issues for Shaw Local News Network. He can be reached at sholland@shawmedia.com.
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October 20, 2026 at 10:02AM
