"No You Can't" - Broad Coalition Rallying Against Obama Center

Here’s something you don’t see every day: Chicago’s progressive Readeraligned with conservative Breitbart. Both had articles Wednesday slamming the Obama Center to be built in Chicago’s Jackson Park.

And everybody in between, it seems, is upset with the proposed center for one reason or another.

The community organizer has managed to inspire unusual unity:

Fiscal conservatives worried about our insolvent state object to how some $200 million was quietly appropriated in Illinois’ recently enacted budget for roadways around the center. Federal taxpayers will reimburse Illinois for 80% of that money, which was the subject of our recent Wall Street Journal article.

Local folks have long objected, claiming the Obama Foundation, which is building the center, isn’t directing enough jobs and benefits towards them. No surprise. When I visited the site a few weeks ago it looked like most of the work was being done by the usual Chicago union white guys. The Nation earlier criticized the absence of some form of community benefits agreement.

Many University of Chicago graduates, who serve as de facto guardians of the architectural and intellectual standards of the neighborhood, don’t want a scar on the area. Some are behind the federal lawsuit now pending to stop construction.

Believers of the rule of law say statutes were trampled on to cram authorization through, which is outlined in the legal complaint.

First Amendment hawks like me object to use of taxpayer money and exceptionally valuable land for what will be a political training camp in part. A First Amendment claim is part of the lawsuit.

Environmentalists and conservationists were particularly infuriated to see pictures of mature trees being mowed down for the center on land that’s supposed to be permanently dedicated as parkland.

And everybody just seems fed up with all the lying, including the federal judge. It was originally pitched as privately funded, presidential library, but it’s neither. Recently, the city got the judge to allow it to continue mowing down trees on the parkland site based on the city’s claims that its work was separate from the center. The plaintiffs in the lawsuit filed a motion saying the city basically lied about that. Before that motion would be heard, the city turned tail and agreed to halt its work.

The judge, apparently unhappy with the city’s conduct, said Thursday he was “disappointed” with what it had represented to the court, and proceeded to issue an order helping the activists seeking to block the center. According to the Chicago Sun-Times, he set the next court hearing for Oct. 24, which will allow the activists to make a presentation to the judge before the City Council votes on the project — and they can use the discovery process to force the city to reveal information.

That City Council vote will be on a new ordinance that would, among other things, ratify a 99-year lease of the parkland for total rent of $10. The proposed ordinance basically puts lipstick on a pig, as opponents see things.

See the rebuttal to the ordinance below by Herb Caplan, one of the University of Chicago grads behind the lawsuit.

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