Losing even one convention due to a casino could have significant adverse impacts on City and State revenues and jobs,” City Hall’s evaluation said. “MPEA and convention center business drives $1.9 billion of economic impact for the City based on 2019 events. It discarded the two bids involving McCormick Place. It took the Lightfoot team just over a month to respond. The 1.73 billion proposal now heads to the Illinois Gaming Board, which must license Ballys to operate the Chicago casino set to be built along the Chicago.
There was talk of bureaucratic hurdles, including a need to change state law, before any deal could be struck.Ĭlark conjured an image of delays and cost escalations for the city’s casino ambitions, stymied for most of the last 30 years. Saying that all she knew about the casino was what she saw in the public proposals, Clark warned that the authority would need to spend maybe $1 billion to replace space if the meetings industry continues to recover from the pandemic. Bally's 1.7 billion plan not only includes a casino, but also a 3,000-seat theater, a Chicago sports museum, a 500 room hotel tower, 10 restaurants and bars, and more. Last month, Larita Clark, CEO of the authority, delivered a blistering critique of the proposals involving convention center property. But under the city’s process, nobody was allowed to communicate with the Metropolitan Pier and Exposition Authority, which runs McCormick Place.
