{"id":2411974,"date":"2026-05-11T18:21:31","date_gmt":"2026-05-11T18:21:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/?p=2411974"},"modified":"2026-05-11T18:21:31","modified_gmt":"2026-05-11T18:21:31","slug":"city-council-panel-backs-tax-incentives-for-united-center-entertainment-district","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/city-council-panel-backs-tax-incentives-for-united-center-entertainment-district\/","title":{"rendered":"City Council panel backs tax incentives for United Center entertainment district"},"content":{"rendered":"

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Chicago taxpayers should help bankroll development of a \u201ccultural and entertainment district\u201d<\/a> around the West Side\u2019s United Center, a key city panel said Monday.<\/p>\n

The City Council\u2019s Committee on Economic, Capital and Technology Development voted unanimously to provide $54.7 million in tax breaks for the first phase of the massive development planned by the owners of the Bulls and the Blackhawks. The measure still needs full City Council approval.<\/p>\n

The $7 billion \u201c1901 Project\u201d is meant to transform surface parking lots around the United Center into an entertainment district with a 6,000-seat music hall, public parks, a hotel and residential units.<\/p>\n

The tax abatement \u2014 which would be applied over 12 years \u2014 would be the first infusion of public funding for the privately-owned stadium and came as \u201ca surprise to some of us,\u201d said Ald. Nicole Lee (11th), since it wasn\u2019t part of the initial announcement of the project.<\/p>\n

The tax relief would come in the form of a 7(b) incentive for the first phase, which allows the property to be assessed at a lower percentage than it would be otherwise.<\/p>\n

That type of incentive is only for projects that would not be viable without the tax assistance, and where the project is located in an economically depressed area in need of development. The measure advanced Monday also requires the developers to invest $500 million into the first phase.<\/p>\n

The measure was approved despite some pushback from members concerned about diversity, who were angered to learn that none of the construction firms tapped for the first phase of the project thus far are Latino-owned.<\/p>\n

In response, a lawyer representing the owners of the United Center vowed that \u201cthere will be Latino\u2026 participation in this project.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWe haven\u2019t started construction yet, and so we haven\u2019t identified some of those sub[contractors],\u201d said Katie Jahnke Dale, with the firm DLA Piper. \u201cBut I, just, none of us here have the answer on how the first three [contractors] were selected.\u201d<\/p>\n

Committee chair Derrick Curtis (18th) said that questions about representation should be answered before he calls the measure for a full council vote.<\/p>\n

Mayor Brandon Johnson introduced the tax assistance plan in March and has defended it since, even as the city remains cash-strapped and Johnson has railed against tax incentives being considered at the state level for the Chicago Bears and a proposed stadium<\/a> in Arlington Heights.<\/p>\n

Johnson said in March that the project would bring much needed jobs and development to the West Side.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is a project that is going to create thousands of jobs and opportunities for the people across the city, but particularly for development on the West Side,\u201d Johnson told reporters.<\/p>\n

The project will be the first major development in the area in decades.<\/p>\n

It will be overseen by freshman Ald. Walter \u201cRed\u201d Burnett (27th) who succeeded his father last year and grew up near the United Center.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen people think about West Loop and Fulton Market, they assume that the United Center, Near West Side, is a part of that. It\u2019s not the case. We\u2019ve seen more buildings deconstructed west of Ashland than we have in any other part on the West Side of Chicago,\u201d Burnett said.<\/p>\n

\u201cI remember personally going to Popeyes on Ashland and Madison growing up, because that was the closest restaurant that we had. That was demolished 10 years ago.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\u2018 The preceding article may include information circulated by third parties \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n

\u2018 Some details of this article were extracted from the following source chicago.suntimes.com \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Chicago taxpayers should help bankroll development of a \u201ccultural and entertainment district\u201d around the West Side\u2019s United Center, a key city panel said Monday. The City Council\u2019s Committee on Economic, Capital and Technology Development voted unanimously to provide $54.7 million in tax breaks for the first phase of the massive development planned by the owners […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":2411975,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":[],"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[25172],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2411974","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-entertainment"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/City-Council-panel-backs-tax-incentives-for-United-Center-entertainment.com2Fbrightspot2F9a2F082Fe14.jpeg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2411974","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2411974"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2411974\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2411976,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2411974\/revisions\/2411976"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2411975"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2411974"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2411974"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2411974"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}