* Subscribers have been briefed on this and other topics all day. From Crain’s: “Illinois lawmakers push Bears stadium plan tied to tax overhaul”…

Illinois House leaders are hoping to move three consequential bills this week in a coordinated effort to advance legislation that could help the Chicago Bears move to Arlington Heights while asking voters if they’d like to impose an extra tax on millionaires. […]

The heart of the megaproject bill would authorize large developers, like the Bears in Arlington Heights, to negotiate a lower property tax payment with local taxing bodies known as a payment in lieu of taxes, or PILOT. The Bears have sought the legislation for years, framing the significant reduction in taxes as “property tax certainty.” […]

The amendment filed by Rep. Kam Buckner, who has led negotiations for the House, would now take 50% of that payment and set it aside for property tax relief. That set-aside would be split, with relief aimed at locals receiving 60% and state efforts netting the other 40%. […]

State Rep. Will Guzzardi, who represents a progressive stronghold on Chicago’s Northwest Side, said he will not view the millionaire tax and megaproject bill in tandem.

Guzzardi chairs the Progressive Caucus.

The Speaker wants to tie the education funding aspect of the constitutional amendment with the megaprojects deal since it would take half of the money from PILOT payments for property tax rebates.

The House Democrats are caucusing as I write this.

*** UPDATE 1 *** Rep. Kam Buckner talked to reporters after the caucus meeting…

Buckner: There were a lot of folks satisfied with some of the changes to be made, some things that we gotta tighten up. But I think all in all, those are very positive fights.

Q: What’s next, as far as today goes and this week.

Buckner: So my plan, and my hope is to be able to get to some language that is fine tuned, that we’re able to call in committee tomorrow. Got some more work to do to get there, but that’s the plan.

Q: What are some specific changes that are going to be incorporated into the amendment based on the conversation [in caucus]?

Buckner: One big one is that we heard from our members that they don’t want this to be used for data centers. So data centers are excluded from this. There’s some more accountability measures that the developer and the municipality every five years have to give a report to the General Assembly about what’s working, what’s not working, the entire snapshot. There are other things, like no double dipping when it comes to TIF, I changed some of the duration, the freeze duration numbers. Initially I wanted to start a 15 years for the lowest tier, but it’s been moved to 25 years. Because if these tools are competing with TIF, I want this to be the thing that’s more attractive, because this is a much better program than TIF. There are other things, like the definition of a local Review Board, making sure the local Review Board has some real teeth, not just to approve the deal, but to actually negotiate the deal. These were things that I talked about with the Illinois Federation of Teachers. And in all, in all, I think there are a lot more guardrails to make this more palatable for for the folks who just left out that way. [From Rich: This was all in the draft bill he presented. So, he wasn’t talking about changes that have to be made as a result of today’s meeting.]

Isabel: How does this impact the Arlington Heights school district’s agreements with the Bears already?

Buckner: So we’ve been in lockstep with the Bears and the other folks who are looking to use this development tool. I don’t see this, and to this point, they have not told us, if this blows up, what they’re trying to do. Once again, we’re still working through the specifics, and when the amendment is filed, it will speak to whatever conversations I have when I leave here.

Q: Do you think adding that property tax relief, that taking 50% of that could potentially push the total payment up? You know, Arlington Heights and those districts might say we’re only receiving 50% of x now, so x needs to be higher, and are the Bears concerned?

Buckner: There’s a possibility that this will change the complexion of those negotiations. But once again, I think my caucus has made it very clear that there has to be something in this for people, right? And so I think those are conversations that people are willing to have to figure out how we move forward. The focus is on building Arlington Heights. But I think if you look at the companies and the developers around the state who will be willing to use this having a very stable flow of resources, back to the people. I think will be important to the local review boards, to mayors, to managers, to school districts, to mosquito abatement boards to police and buyer districts, all of those things that are part of our public services. […]

Q: Any discussions with the Senate? Senate President Harmon was pretty skeptical of the bill as it was introduced.

Buckner: Yeah, the bill as introduced a couple months ago was skeptical for me as well, and I had to present it right. But I think I got some marching orders from my caucus to put together an amendment that it looked more like what was important to us. I’ve been in lockstep with both Deputy Governor Manar and Senator leader Cunningham on this. And so obviously they have not had a chance to caucus on this, yet they will when they get back. But I think our job right now is to try to move this forward, and if there are more conversations that need to be had, of course we’ll have them.

Q: …do you expect this has enough support to pass the House?

Buckner: I think it will. And so obviously, there’s some things I got to go back and look at based on comments we heard today. Some more conversations need to happen. But the intent and the hope is that we can get to a position where we can move something tomorrow.

*** UPDATE 2 *** Rep. Buckner said he’d been in “lockstep” with the governor’s office, so I reached out to the governor’s office for comment…

The Governor’s Office is currently reviewing the draft amendment provided by Capitol Fax and does not have comment at this time.