Lightfoot’s success in having the tax rates revised was a needed feature in making a downtown casino viable. Changes in fiscal bill boost Chicago casino viability Additionally, Hawthorne Race Course has a sports wagering license and is expected to launch its sportsbook prior to the start of the NFL season.

Six sportsbooks are currently active among the state’s 10 operating casinos, while a seventh does have a sports wagering license and has yet to go live. That bill also legalized sports betting in the Prairie State, which went live in March for less than a week before casinos across the state were shuttered due to COVID-19.

The downtown area was one of six places designated for a casino in the gaming expansion bill Illinois Gov. “This is the right time to begin having these discussions as we continue to lay the foundation to make a strong recovery from the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic.”

“After securing favorable legislation that had eluded us for decades, Chicago can finally pursue a once-in-a-generation opportunity to bring a casino to our city, generating hundreds of millions in new gaming revenues to shore up the City’s pension obligations and drive huge levels of infrastructure funding in Illinois as well as creating thousands of new and much-needed jobs for local residents,” Lightfoot said in a statement Thursday. A downtown casino has long been a goal of mayoral administrations in Chicago, including current Mayor Lori Lightfoot, who has actively sought one since taking office in May 2019. The RFI comes approximately three months after Illinois lawmakers passed a $40 billion budget for the fiscal year, and within that bill was an extensive rewrite of the tax rates for any casino that would be built in the downtown area. The city of Chicago took another small step towards the building of a casino in the downtown area Thursday, issuing a RFI (Request for Information) seeking ideas and strategies to “develop and operate a world-class casino in Chicago.”

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