Mayor Daley Defends Bogus PSL Tax

Mayor Richard Daley is defending the City of Chicago’s amusement tax as this issue is starting to heat up.  His honor has some distorted view of fans flipping their PSL’s and turning big profits.

"“They’re flipping it,” Daley said of the owners who sold the licenses that give fans the right to then purchase season tickets.“They start selling these licenses. . . . In other words, I bought it for $1,000. I sold it for $5,000. That’s all they’re doing. So, we caught ’em. . . . Some of ’em are just trying not to pay the tax.”"

Hey Mr. Mayor, if you’re going to go after people for “flipping” tickets, how about you go after all of the ticket brokers that buy up tickets and then sell them for HUGE profits???

Bears fans are not taking this sitting down.  Five fans have already jumped on a class action lawsuit.  Attorney Keith Hunt seems to make perfect sense to me:

"“You only get to enter once. You only buy one ticket. They should only be able to collect one tax — not two. They don’t get to tax you on the way in and on the way out.”Hunt noted that the amusement tax ordinance specifically describes the tax as a 9 percent fee on “charges paid for the privilege to enter” an entertainment event.“A PSL does not give you the right to enter. It only gives you the right to buy tickets. If you go up to Soldier Field with your PSL agreement in your hand, they won’t let you in unless you also have a ticket,” he said."

The class action suit also seeks to recoup about $10 million in amusement taxes that were originally collected.  Letters seeking back taxes were sent out to some 2700 season ticket holders which purchased their PSL’s secondhand.  Stay tuned for more details to see how this pans out.