Update on Obama Center Review and Lawsuit
On May 20, 2020, the City of Chicago hosted the second of three virtual meetings aimed at resolving adverse effects from the construction of the Obama Presidential Center (OPC) in Chicago’s National Register-listed Jackson Park. As was the case with the first such meeting on May 6, the discussion with consulting parties was expressly limited to measures aimed at mitigating adverse effects documented in the (AOE), thereby excluding all discussion of potential measures to avoid or minimize adverse effects. Although the city’s stated that mitigation measures should be “commensurate with the impact to the historic resource,” the results presented from a survey of consulting parties mainly included ideas akin to placing plaques in the park—measures hardly commensurate with the documented adverse effects that would be imposed on Jackson Park by the OPC.
That is because when the survey results were tallied, “many comments relating to avoidance measures that were previously considered and dismissed” were not included. The Federal Highway Administration (FHWA), which is conducting the applicable federal review under Section 106 of the National Historic Preservation Act, has indeed “dismissed” those measures, repeatedly stating that both the design and location of the OPC are beyond its purview. But if that is the case, then why did the Advisory Council on Historic Preservation (ACHP) initially advise the FHWA to analyze adverse effects from the OPC’s design and location, which are now writ large in the AOE? Why was the height of the OPC tower—clearly a design element—used to establish the very extent of the Area of Potential Effects underlying the federal review, if the tower itself were an element whose adverse effects could never potentially be avoided or minimized? In other words, why, over the course of two years, have a slew of state and federal agencies, along with numerous consulting parties, poured thousands of hours and hundreds of thousands—if not millions—of dollars into assessing effects that are now simply declared to be beyond consideration?