Why the Bears need new management/ownership

[WindyCitySports 407]

When Tom and Kay Dalton bought personal seat licenses for the new Soldier Field, they figured it was a lifelong investment.

 

The Poplar Grove couple had been Bears season ticket holders since 1988 and considered the $4,420 they paid for four seats in Section 128, Row 19, a family affair.

 

"One of the reasons we even bought PSLs, it's in our contract that we could bequeath them to our daughters," Kay Dalton said. "These seats are being willed to our daughters."

 

They might also want to will some ponchos or an umbrella.

 

Since the rebuilt stadium opened in 2003, the Daltons have endured a bizarre and frustrating water torture — a waterfall of dingy runoff that collects in the upper levels and cascades onto their seats.

 

The couple said the dripping occurs, on average, five or six games a year and is often heavy enough to drench them from head to toe. It's also enough dampen their enthusiasm for the seats, which are located in the stadium's southwest corner and collectively cost about $4,000 a year.

 

"It doesn't seem to smell or anything like that," Kay Dalton said of the mucky water. "The thing is, it doesn't have to rain or snow for you to get dripped on. Sometimes, you just get dripped on."

 

She said the couple has complained repeatedly about the drainage, but the complaints have largely fallen on deaf ears.

 

"When it does happen, the engineers come over, they take note of what happened," she said. "They say they'll report it to the park district because it's a park district issue. The park district says it's the people in the stadium."

 

On games when the deluge is particularly bad, stadium employees have offered to move the Daltons to drier seats. But the alternative seats are usually farther into the end zone, and sometimes there aren't four together. For a few games, they were offered folding seats in the handicapped area, Tom Dalton said. They've also been handed ponchos.

 

The couple said the only time a Bears representative called them to discuss the problem was in 2008, when then-Director of Ticket Operations George McCaskey called and offered to move them closer to midfield. Those tickets, they said, were simply too expensive. Besides, part of the fun of going to the games is talking with their season ticket neighbors, they said.

 

Hoping to get the dripping fixed during the offseason, one of the couple's daughters, Dana Wiley, emailed What's Your Problem? last month.

 

"It is an issue not just from an ickiness perspective, but my parents are both older," Wiley wrote. "My mom uses a walker, so having slippery steps and areas is an issue."

 

Kay Dalton said the couple has filled complaint forms about a dozen times, but the issue has never been fixed.

 

"We got a little irritated because (the Bears) send out a letter every year. They say they're going to raise ticket prices, but they never get back to us on anything we ask them about," she said.

 

The Problem Solver called Bears spokesman Scott Hagel, who promptly looked into the Daltons' case. The next day, Hagel called back to say the Bears and the stadium's management company, SMG, will examine the problem and attempt to come up with a solution.

 

"I can't make any promises about solving it forever," Hagel said. "Unfortunately, there are a few areas in the stadium that have dripping issues. We are continually working on solutions to make those areas as good as they can be. The unfortunate truth of the situation is there are some areas that are more challenging than others. Section 128 is one of those sections."

 

Hagel said last season was particularly bad because there was a large amount of snow, which caused some drip pans and gutters to freeze over.

 

"Just given the design of an outdoor venue and when you have the weather elements like we do in Chicago, sometimes there's not a permanent solution," Hagel said.

 

A short time later, a Bears official called the Daltons and said that other than the 2008 call from McCaskey, the team had no record of the couple's previous complaints.

 

In the latest call, the Bears official offered to move the couple two sections over, further into the end zone. To complete the deal, the Bears would refund the money the couple originally paid for their PSLs, and the Daltons would have to pay for new PSLs at the current market price.

 

The Daltons said that would cost them an additional $8,000. They declined.

 

"We said no," Kay Dalton said. "We didn't think this was a good investment on our part. We said we were going to stay where we were."

 

She said the Bears also offered to move them to a handicapped section.

 

"We explained that we didn't want to move away from the people we have grown to know in our section," she said. "We didn't want inferior seats."

 

The couple said that, ideally, the Bears would fix the dripping or offer comparable seats that are not underneath a drip area for no additional cost.

 

"Everyone always says they feel bad for us, but no one will take responsibility for fixing it," Kay Dalton said. "We do everything we're supposed to do. It's like they don't even care, because they don't bother."

- John Yates, http://www.chicagotribune.com/business/problemsolver/ct-biz-0410-problem-dalton-20110410,0,7535398.column

 

Non-Bear fans may not find this interesting, but I think that Bear fans will.

 

The Bears management is one of the worst in the NFL. Things like this happen all the time, and the management doesn't have any will to communicate with the fans about it.

Edited April 10, 2011 by WindyCitySports

[rzb+ 367]

Just run a gutter across and out of the stadium. Problem solved.