This op-ed first appeared in the Chicago Sun-Times on August 22, 2023 (Online) and August 25, 2023 (print): https://chicago.suntimes.com/2023/8/22/23841796/northwestern-ryan-field-stadium-rebuild-letters-evanston-steven-harper-op-ed

If NU successfully pushes the proposed new stadium through Evanston City Council, the wounds to the community will take generations to heal, lawyer Steven Harper writes.

Everyone has a price? What’s yours?

Last Thursday, Northwestern University President Michael Schill sent that message in his desperate quest to save billionaire donor Pat Ryan’s vanity project: an open-air performance venue masquerading as a shrine to a disgraced football program. Amid the firestorm of growing opposition, Schill released two letters.

One went to the “Northwestern community” — where a faculty in revolt has called for a pause in the plan. Another went to the “Evanston community” — where NU has exacerbated schisms in its divide-and-conquer strategy to push the project through the Evanston City Council.

Even in those two letters, Schill couldn’t keep his story straight.

No two ways on finances

Schill addressed a Northwestern community concerned about misguided university priorities resulting in a plan costing $800 million. A big chunk comes from the Ryan family. But NU’s share — hundreds of millions — could be spent pursuing its actual educational mission.

Seeking to assuage that group, he said that, even without concerts in a new performance venue, the existing stadium would require equally costly repairs:

“Northwestern would have to make a similar financial investment to restore the current, crumbling Ryan Field to an adequate level to play seven football games per year as it will to create the new Ryan Field.” (Emphasis supplied)

But when addressing the Evanston community, Schill said that at least six major concerts in the proposed venue were necessary “to realistically operate the venue” and to “ensuring financial viability for the project to move forward.”

He can’t have it both ways.

No listening or learning

Schill told the Evanston community that NU had conducted “meetings and forums” where it had an opportunity to “listen and learn” from its neighbors.

Meetings? Only on NU’s terms. Listening and learning? Nope. 

Before Schill’s presidency, NU formed a working group in February 2022. It consisted of NU representatives, residents, and an Evanston City Council member. Residents in the group canvassed the surrounding community extensively and reported its views on a new football stadium. 

Then NU ignored them.

On Sept. 28, 2022, NU released its proposed stadium design to the media. Two weeks later, it announced that the venue would host major concerts and sell alcohol. A member of the working group later wrote: “This was another complete surprise to us because we had repeatedly emphasized the neighbors’ request that the use of the stadium not be expanded.” (Emphasis supplied)

Recently, NU proved again that it listens only to what it wants to hear. The university joined the City of Evanston’s motion asking a federal court to quash criticismof the new Ryan Field proposal at “town-gown” committee meetings that have occurred for the past 19 years. The court denied the request. 

Schill also told the Evanston community that “[o]ur goal has always been to host community-oriented events such as winter festivals, holiday celebrations, family movie nights, and youth sports events, as well as additional student and community programming to take full advantage of the plazas and new park being built.”

NU could do all of that today without building a United Center (North) — without a roof.

Whose project is it?

Schill is just the messenger. The project is Pat Ryan’s.

To the Evanston community, Schill expressed “thanks to a remarkably generous gift from the Ryan Family…” and announced that they, not NU, had offered another $10 million to create a “workforce technology upskilling program.”

Will Ryan’s additional money buy the love needed to get the plan through the city council?

Schill also tempted Evanston to start down a slippery slope: Allow more concerts and you’ll get more money. And he’s using other people’s money to do it: tax and fee revenue “tied to events at the new stadium” and a “ticket surcharge” that concertgoers would pay, not NU.

Likewise paying homage to NU’s biggest donor, Schill told the Northwestern community: “We have arrived at this pivotal point in the Ryan Field rebuild project thanks to a remarkably generous gift from the Ryan Family.”

Schill’s tone-deafness continued to the final sentence of his missive to the Northwestern community: “I firmly believe this rebuild will help us create an opportunity to build toward a positive and exciting future where we do what we do best at Northwestern — bring people together and positively impact communities.”

Schill, Ryan, and the board of trustees have fractured their relationship with the faculty, exploited divisions among residents, and negatively impacted nearby communities.

It will take years for NU to recover from its athletic team scandals. If NU builds the new performance venue, the resulting wounds will endure for generations. 

Steven J. Harper, a Northwestern University and Harvard Law School graduate, is an attorney, adjunct professor at Northwestern Law School, former partner at Kirkland & Ellis LLP, and author of several books.

This op-ed first appeared in the Chicago Sun-Times on August 7, 2023 (online – https://chicago.suntimes.com/2023/8/7/23820166/northwestern-stadium-evanston-tripp-umbach-report-cost-benefit-analysis-steven-harper) and August 8, 2023 (print edition)

The opening pages read as if the billionaire sponsor of the project, Pat Ryan, had written them himself.

***

Northwestern University President Michael Schill outlined the criteria for proceeding with NU’s pop/rock performance arena to replace its current football stadium. Trying to distance the project from burgeoning scandals surrounding the school’s athletic programs, he told The Daily Northwestern:

“Ryan Field needs to be resolved on its own merits and based upon the benefits that it will create for the community versus the costs that will occur.”

If Schill and the board of trustees actually applied that standard, NU’s plan would have reached the dustbin of history long ago.

Schill, a Princeton University and Yale Law School graduate, knows what a real cost-benefit analysis looks like. He also knows that consulting firm Tripp Umbach’s report — the sole basis for the stadium’s claimed economic benefits to the community — isn’t one. The opening pages read as if the billionaire sponsor of the project, Pat Ryan, had written them himself:

“In September 2021, esteemed Northwestern alumni Patrick G. Ryan and Shirley W. Ryan committed the largest philanthropic gift in Northwestern history….”

“Now, catalyzed by the unparalleled generosity of the Ryan family….”

It’s a puff piece, not a rigorous assessment of the proposed stadium’s economic impact on the community.

A Cost-Benefit Analysis Doesn’t Ignore Costs

In addition to numerous methodological pitfalls and plain inaccuracies in its underlying assumptions, Tripp Umbach’s approach considers only the benefits of the proposed stadium and ignores costs. Describing the underlying computer model (IMPLAN) used in the analysis, economist Jon Sanders explained, “[T]his is a model of sums — it is all plus signs. Despite what it says, it doesn’t measure the total economic impact; it measures only benefits…”

The report also ignores externalities — costs that the project will inflict on victims in Evanston and beyond. Examples:

• Northwestern’s acoustic consultant has mapped dangerous projected levels of noise pollution that will travel far into Evanston andWilmette residential areas.
• Concert semi-tractor trailer trucks and shuttle buses emitting dangerous pollutants will damage roadways. Traffic congestion will delay anyone trying to reach the Level 1 trauma center at a hospital less than 2,000 feet from the stadium. (Here’s a video of the street separating Evanston and Wilmette shortly before a February 2023 basketball game at Welsh-Ryan Arena, which has one-fourth the seating capacity of the proposed stadium.)
• Northwestern’s planned arena will irreparably damage the quality of life in a residential community that includes parks, schools, playgrounds and churches. (Here’s a 2½-minute time-lapse video depicting the seven-day load-in and set-up for a rock concert at a comparably sized stadium in Dresden.) 

Hypocrisy at the Highest Level

Fifty years ago, sociologist William Bruce Cameron wrote, “Not everything that can be counted counts, and not everything that counts can be counted.” Northwestern Board of Trustees Chairman Peter Barris understands that principle. But he ignores it unless the project interferes with the quiet enjoyment of his property.

Barris has a Martha’s Vineyard home worth $24 million. It’s across the water from a century-old landmark hotel where the cast of Jaws stayed in 1975. Railing against an “assault on the very character of the neighborhood,” Barris sought to rein in the hotel’s 2021 expansion.

“Although our residence is a mile away by road, it sits directly across the harbor,” he wrote to his local government. “Sounds are very efficiently carried across the water, particularly when the winds are blowing out of the north.” His request: “Protect us from the unbridled development that puts at risk the very things that brought us here in the first place.” 

Asked about the letter In light of Northwestern’s assault on its community, Barris said, “The surfacing of this personal circumstance, which is distinctly dissimilar to Northwestern’s proposal, is an attempt to distract from our goals — to transform a century-old stadium into a community asset that will benefit all of Evanston….”

Benefits? Evanston jobs and tax revenue, Tripp Umbach claims. But it calculates that after construction, the new arena will create at most 323 new Evanston jobs, with no assurance that Evanston residents will fill any of them.

At most, concert events could generate additional annual tax revenue equal to about one-half of 1% of the combined budgets for Evanston and its two school districts.

The only other claimed benefits are intangible, as are those Tripp Umbach ignored on the cost side of the arena’s ledger. Meanwhile, residents will suffer from the externalities.

So in the long run, who really benefits? A billionaire who gets his name on another Northwestern building — and a disgraced athletic program in disarray.

All at another cost that isn’t in the Tripp Umbach report: a legacy of ongoing division inside and outside the university.

Steven J. Harper, a Northwestern University and Harvard Law School graduate, is an attorney, adjunct professor at Northwestern Law School, former partner at Kirkland & Ellis LLP, and author of several books.

This op-ed first appeared in Crain’s Chicago Business on July 25, 2023: (https://www.chicagobusiness.com/opinion/northwestern-should-give-new-ryan-field-opinion)

Letter writer Joseph Flanagan urges Northwestern University not to give up on its proposed new Ryan Field. But the venture was misguided from the start, and it hasn’t aged well.

First, it violates fundamental principles that guide the university’s stated mission:

“Northwestern is committed to excellent teaching, innovative research and the personal and intellectual growth of its students in a diverse academic community.”

Northwestern doesn’t want to renovate the existing stadium for students. The nonprofit institution seeks to construct a major performance venue that would compete with the United Center (seating capacity: 23,500) and Allstate Arena (seating capacity: 18,500).

Nor does the university propose a handful of outdoor events. In addition to 10 concerts with seating for 28,500, it wants an unlimited number of additional concerts for 10,000 fans — 50% more than the capacity of the Welsh-Ryan Arena.

Except for a handful of college football games, there’s nothing in this for the students. NU’s consultants have acknowledged that the outdoor concerts would occur during the late spring through early fall, when most students are away.

Second, Patrick Ryan and his family are contributing toward the stadium, but their pledge doesn’t cover its $800 million cost. The remaining balance — hundreds of millions of dollars — will come from Northwestern funds that could actually have been used for purposes that are consistent with its mission statement.

Third, concerts will generate dangerous noise pollution blanketing blocks of a residential area that includes schools, playgrounds, parks, churches, a fire station and a hospital with a Level 1 trauma center. How dangerous and how far away? For weeks, NU has stonewalled requests for its consultants’ data answering those questions.

Fourth, Northwestern has yet to develop a credible, comprehensive transportation management plan for the unprecedented burdens on the community that the concerts would create.

Fifth, Flanagan asserts, “The project is estimated to bring in more than $10 million to Evanston in direct fees the first year alone.” But those are a one-time occurrence for construction permits and fees. His claimed “millions in subsequent years” actually amount to a net increase of about $3.5 million annually — one-half of 1 percent of the combined annual budgets for Evanston and its two school districts. Likewise, when the dust settles and the 3,000 construction jobs disappear, the new stadium would create, at most, about 300 new Evanston jobs.

Instead of creating a “community hub,” Northwestern’s proposal is generating schisms in Evanston and beyond. More than 250 NU professors have signed an open letter to President Michael Schill and other leaders, urging them to halt the project “until (the hazing) crisis is satisfactorily resolved.

Patrick Ryan could stop the madness with a single public statement. Absent that, he is creating a legacy of irreparable division inside and outside a university that he surely loves.

Steven Harper is a former partner at Kirkland & Ellis and Northwestern graduate. He is also an adjunct professor at Northwestern and an author of several books.