The Chicago Red Stars might seek legal action as Riot Fest’s relocation to Bridgeview could force the National Women’s Soccer League team to move a game in September, sources told the Tribune.
Riot Fest on Wednesday announced it is moving to SeatGeek Stadium in the southwest suburb. The music festival will run from Sept. 20-22 — conflicting with the Sept. 21 Red Stars-San Diego Wave match. The decision drew ire from Red Stars leadership, which is now scrambling to find a new home for a nationally broadcast match in a whiplash moment only four days after drawing a league-record crowd for a match at Wrigley Field.
“It’s devastating,” team President Karen Leetzow told the Tribune. “It’s devastating to have to go from that kind of a high to this kind of a low, to tell your staff and players that this is the level of respect we’ve gotten immediately after delivering that event.”
Bridgeview Mayor Steven Landek first informed the Red Stars in early May of a potential need to vacate the stadium for the Sept. 21 game, sources told the Tribune. After that initial conversation, the Red Stars never received any follow-up or logistical support from the mayor’s office, even after reaching out for clarification, those sources said.
The Red Stars found out Bridgeview was moving forward with plans to use the stadium on that date when a lawyer for Riot Fest reached out to the club earlier this month in regard to signing a contract with the village.
Landek did not respond to a message the Tribune left seeking comment on the situation. However, the Village of Bridgeview released a statement Thursday morning disputing the club’s timeline of events, claiming the Red Stars were first informed of a potential conflict in April and have since “failed to respond” to correspondence from the village attempting to work through the logistics of hosting the game amid the festival.
“The Village’s decision to schedule Riot Fest had nothing to do with gender,” the statement read. “The Village’s decision was strictly based on maximizing revenues from the Stadium for the Village taxpayers.”
The current lease allows the village to host ancillary events at SeatGeek Stadium at the same time as Red Stars games. However, the lease specifies that the stadium must be available for the specified use, which includes parking and accessibility to the stadium.
The conflict between the Red Stars and Bridgeview centers around whether it’s reasonably viable to host the game simultaneously with the multistage music festival. The village maintains that “virtually all professional teams that played at the Stadium, including the Fire, the Hounds, and the Red Stars themselves, have moved games or worked successfully with the Village to hold concurrent events without issues.”
The scope of Riot Fest raises other concerns — for instance, how noise from a multistage festival could interfere with a referee’s ability to officiate the game as well as the safety of players, staff and fans coming and going to the stadium — that led the Red Stars to feel it would be impossible to host the game as scheduled.
As of Wednesday the Red Stars had not received any information on the logistics of how both events would be able to coexist or even how Riot Fest plans to use the space.
Photos: Chicago Red Stars set NWSL attendance record at Wrigley Field
The Red Stars have not located a new venue for the match and aren’t certain there would be an appropriate replacement on the same date. The Cubs host the Washington Nationals at Wrigley Field on Sept. 21, while the White Sox will be on a six-game swing in California, leaving Guaranteed Rate Field unoccupied. Neither the Bears nor Fire plays at Soldier Field on that date, but the stadium will be occupied by the HBCU Chicago Football Classic between Morehouse and Kentucky State.
Even if the Red Stars find an appropriate replacement venue, the cost could be prohibitive. If they are able to find a new location, they would want fees and costs to relocate and broadcast the match nationally to come from the involved parties forcing their game out of SeatGeek Stadium. But the club has not received any assurances that either party would contribute to mitigate those costs, sources told the Tribune.
The game holds heightened stakes for the Red Stars and the NWSL as it is slated for a national broadcast on Ion. This complicates the logistics for use of the parking lot amid the festival. Only six of the Red Stars’ 16 remaining regular-season games are scheduled for a national broadcast.
“It is unfair and unfortunate to have our club put in this situation, shining a light on the vast discrepancies in the treatment of women’s professional sports versus men’s professional sports,” Leetzow said in a statement. “We are committed to ensuring our players and fans have a first-rate experience on and off the pitch, and we are working diligently to find a solution that will ensure our September 21st game is a success.”
The conflict comes at a turning point for the Red Stars, who on Saturday drew a league-record 35,038 fans to Wrigley Field for a match against Bay FC.
The Red Stars have played at SeatGeek since 2016. The stadium’s distance from the city center and lack of transit access have been key points of criticism by the franchise as it continues to slip behind competitors in attendance. The Fire in 2019 paid more than $60 million to leave SeatGeek for Soldier Field.
The Red Stars’ SeatGeek lease will expire at the end of 2025. New ownership helmed by Cubs co-owner Laura Ricketts has made it clear that relocating the franchise to a stadium inside the city limits is a driving goal.
Riot Fest — which will be headlined by Beck, Public Enemy, the Marley Brothers and Fall Out Boy — had been a source of contention for residents in North Lawndale since its relocation to Douglass Park in 2015 and before that with locals in Humboldt Park since 2012.
