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A lawsuit that aimed to stop the Obama Presidential Center from being built in Chicago’s historic Jackson Park has been dismissed by a federal judge. The crux of Protect Our Parks’ complaint is that under regulatory statutes, federal agencies should have considered relocating the proposed Obama center site entirely to avoid damage to the environment, according to the lawsuit. The city and Obama Foundation officials have said federal agencies closed the final review into the project because they determined the Obama center’s construction and nearby roadway fixes would not pose a “significant impact” on the environment - a finding the...

“The Seventh Circuit was skeptical Thursday of a parks advocacy organization’s arguments opposing the construction of the Obama Presidential Center in Chicago’s Jackson Park, in a case that has left many supporters of the former president bewildered and angry. “If the Clinton Foundation had approached New York City and asked for 20 acres of Central Park for its Harlem headquarters, it would have been laughed out of court. “But that is essentially what the Obama Foundation asked of Chicago - and got, in a sweetheart deal inked under former Mayor Rahm Emanuel, who previously served as Obama’s chief of staff....

Removal of trees from the Obama Presidential Center (OPC) site commenced Wednesday, Sept. 1, 2021. Felled trees and stumps could be seen along the northern edge of the Jackson Park Women's Garden. Further south within the OPC footprint more trees had been cut, their stumps remaining in the ground. Earlier in the week, trees in the OPC site had been marked with bands of different colors: blue, green and white. According to a contractor doing a survey of the trees on the site, the trees with green and blue bands were to be "repurposed" and those with white bands were...

An advocacy group focused on protecting public parks in Chicago has asked the Supreme Court to temporarily halt construction of former President Obama’s presidential library which kicked off Monday. In an emergency request for a temporary injunction filed with the Supreme Court on Tuesday, the nonprofit Protect Our Parks argued that the federal government failed to carry out required environmental reviews for the Obama Presidential Center, which is being constructed in the historic Jackson Park. The group has long been opposed to construction of the library in the park located on the city’s South Side, claiming construction will put the...

A Chicago park advocacy group asked the Supreme Court to block construction on former President Obama’s presidential library, on the same day that shovels broke ground on the project. Protect Our Parks and several other plaintiffs made the 11th hour plea to the high court Monday over environmental concerns, according to The Hill. The group asked the court to issue an emergency halt on construction in the city’s Jackson Park on the South Side, claiming that federal, state and local governments broke the project into smaller pieces to sidestep a full environmental assessment, according to the report. The emergency request...

As construction crews on Monday began preliminary work on the $700 million Obama Presidential Center in Jackson Park, a local advocacy group was prepping for another run at stopping it. Protect Our Parks said it would appeal a federal court judge’s decision to deny its emergency request to halt construction. The group is among several that have battled the Obama Foundation in court to move the complex two miles away to Washington Park. Protect Our Parks and other neighborhood organizations want the center built farther south because they believe it will better bolster a needier area with jobs and development,...

A Chicago group made up of residents and environmentalists suing to stop construction of the Obama Presidential Center was dealt a blow Thursday after a federal judge, nominated by Obama, denied their request to halt this month's groundbreaking. Judge John Robert Blakey denied a request by several local residents and the nonprofit group Protect Our Parks, which filed the lawsuit. The suit, among other things, argues that the batch of federal reviews into the former president's $700 million center was faulty. The group claims construction would cause "irreparable harm" to the park by tearing up roads, cutting down trees, and...

CHICAGO (WBBM NEWSRADIO) -- Construction is to begin next month on the Obama Presidential Center unless a court challenge delays it. The group Protect Our Parks has asked a federal court to hold up the start of construction of the Obama Presidential Center in Jackson Park on Aug. 16. In the lawsuit filed in April, the group asked the court to review and enforce the federal laws designed to “to protect local historic sites, environmental impacts, impairment of dedicated public parkland, and related community natural resources.” According to Crain’s, the matter is back in court Tuesday. Protect Our Parks has...

A staunch foe of the Obama Presidential Center’s expected arrival in storied Jackson Park is once again suing to block its construction, according to a federal lawsuit filed Wednesday that argues federal authorities should have relocated the official campus in order to protect the surrounding environment. The complaint from the nonprofit Protect Our Parks and other plaintiffs names the city of Chicago, the Obama Foundation, U.S. Department of Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg and U.S. Department of the Interior Secretary Deb Haaland as defendants. It was filed the same day that preliminary construction for the Obama Presidential Center at Jackson Park...

HYDE PARK - As a polarizing review of the planned Obama Presidential Center’s impact on Jackson Park nears the end of its third year, officials say an agreement to address any negative effects the center would have on the park is still a long way off. The so-called Section 106 review process, ongoing since 2017, has found the Obama Center’s construction would affect the historic nature of Jackson Park and the Midway Plaisance. To address these concerns, a draft agreement released July 9 calls for: - The city to file new National Register of Historic Places nominations for Jackson Park...

CHICAGO - A lawsuit over the planned Obama Presidential Center’s campus in Jackson Park has stalled after a federal appeals court panel ruled the plaintiffs did not suffer actual harm and that many of their grievances were not within the court’s jurisdiction. The 7th Circuit for the U.S. Court of Appeals issued the ruling on Friday, more than two years after community group Protect Our Parks Inc. filed suit alleging the Chicago Park District and the city of Chicago improperly transferred public park land to the Obama Foundation for private use. The decision to remand the case means the lawsuit...

Initially, Obama Foundation officials ambitiously predicted they would break ground on the construction in 2018 and said they expected the center to open in 2021. Then they had to push that timeline back. Most recently, the foundation has hesitated to publicly release an updated timeline.

While promoting his book “Southern Exposure” about architectural design on the South Side, former Sun-Times architecture critic Lee Bey questioned both the design of the Obama Presidential Center and its proposed placement in Jackson Park. “The design of the library, I do not like. I think that that tower is foolishness. I think the design is foolishness,” Bey said. “It’s clad in limestone or granite; it’s shoved in this park. If it’s going to be in a park, I think I say in the book, it needs to be a more organic and alive building.” He further questioned the necessity...

(full article title: 'Michelle Obama: Barack could build presidential library anywhere because 'so many people' feel 'like he is their president') Former first lady Michelle Obama suggested that former President Barack Obama could build his presidential library anywhere around the world because people in foreign countries feel like he is their president. Michelle Obama explained at Tuesday's Obama Foundation Summit at the Illinois Institute of Technology that Chicago's Jackson Park was selected as the location for the Obama Presidential Center because it is close to the couple's old home and near her childhood home. “There’s power in the selection of...

Former First Lady Michelle Obama stood in defense of the proposed Obama Presidential Center site in Jackson Park as an intentional, strategic, powerful decision. “Barack’s presidential library could have been anywhere in the world, because there’s so many people who feel like he is their president all over the world, alright?" she said at today's Obama Summit. "New York wanted it, Hawaii wants it, because it’s also an economic engine. It will be a visited presidential library, because it’s going to be alive. It’s a first. We had to think, where do we put this resource?” she said. “Well, what...

**SNIP** “Under the federally-mandated review process, there should be a full study and consideration of ways, first to avoid, then to minimize and then, as a last resort, to mitigate the adverse effects of the plans to build the OPC in historic Jackson Park,” the letter states. Instead, “virtually all the focus” of the City Hall presentation was on “how the city was looking at mitigation. ... They completely skipped consideration of avoidance and minimization,” the letter states. As a result, the meeting “felt a lot like meetings past: an engineered agenda with a pre-determined outcome, paying lip service only...

In a surprising move, a federal judge ruled Tuesday that the city of Chicago was within its authority when it approved the Obama Foundation’s plan to construct the Obama Presidential Center in Jackson Park. After listening to nearly an hour of arguments on both sides, U.S. Judge John Robert Blakey said the construction to the sprawling Obama Center campus can begin and dismissed the lawsuit filed by environmentalists that aimed to halt it. Technically, the foundation still has to finish a federal review process before it can break ground on the $500 million development. But Tuesday’s decision removed one major...

A judge nominated by former President Obama rendered a decision Tuesday that he won’t like. A lawsuit by an advocacy group known as Protect Our Parks can go forward. They are trying to block his presidential library in Chicago. The Associated Press reports that U.S. District Judge John Robert Blakey ruled Tuesday that a lawsuit from an advocacy group accusing the city of illegally transferring public land to a private entity would not be dismissed. The Hill reported a similar lawsuit stopped Star Wars’ George Lucas from building a museum on public land. IT’S A CON GAME The lawsuit by...

A federal lawsuit aiming to halt the construction of the Obama Presidential Center in Jackson Park is getting bigger. Three separate groups on Tuesday filed amicus briefs joining the original suit filed by Protect Our Parks, alleging that it would be illegal for the Obama Foundation to go forward with the project in federally protected parkland. The groups Preservation Chicago and Jackson Park Watch, composed of community members who have been opposed to the project from the beginning, argue that there is no precedent for a museum to be built on protected parkland, contrary to claims the city and Obama...

**SNIP** But recently, as development of the Obama center has faced obstacles and groundbreaking has been pushed back, Winston and some of her neighbors have begun to worry about the project’s fate. It faces a legal challenge in federal court over the use of park space for the center, and its chief local backer, Mayor Rahm Emanuel, recently announced he will not be seeking a third term as mayor. The result is anxiousness that has swept over some residents and communities on the South Side as they brace for a possible long wait, a bitter fight or even another grand...