Governor Rauner is promising that a new billion-dollar business and technology innovation center he's promoting in the South Loop will change the state's economy.
Standing with Mayor Emanuel and representatives of the University of Illinois, Northwestern University and the University of Chicago, Rauner kicked off what's being called the Discovery Partners Institute.
It's planned as a public-private facility for specialized research in computing, agriculture and health, headquartered at the University of Illinois at Champaign-Urbana, but with a 62-acre campus in Chicago.
One hitch is that Rauner plans to use the proceeds from the sale of the Thompson Center to finance the project, but that deal hasn't been finalized.
