Worries remain

Important South Side meeting airs Olympic issues

08/12/2009 10:00 PM

By MICAH MAIDENBERG
Editor

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South Siders, activists and preservationists packed the Urban League on Tuesday for a meeting about the Olympics.
MICAH MAIDENBERG/Staff

Hundreds packed a room at the Chicago Urban League headquarters Tuesday night for a meeting about how a 2016 Olympics here would affect the Near and Mid-South sides.

A thread of skepticism — if not a wholesale rejection — passed through a number of the speakers’ questions and comments.

Residents wondered if the benefits of a Games here would be shared broadly, implemented as promised, and what kind of pressure the Olympics would put on existing communities.

“There’s a lot of people very disturbed about the direction this is going,” 4th Ward resident Kay Carroll said of the bid. “There appears to be a small segment that has a vested interest who’ve benefited.”

Carroll referred to Tribune reports that Michael Scott, president of the Board of Education and a member of an Olympics outreach committee, was planning a development through his private firm on city-owned lots near Douglas Park, a proposed Olympics venue in Lawndale.

The tone of Tuesday’s meeting was set in part by such groups as the Kenwood-Oakland Community Organization, which bused in dozens of affiliates.

“We’re in a neighborhood where thousands of units of affordable housing have disappeared. Where people have been displaced. Two-thirds of those people were supposed to come back. Where they at?” Jitu Brown, an organizer with the Kenwood-Oakland group. “We can’t just support, ‘Trust us. We’re good people.’ ”

A large contingent of preservationists, meanwhile, sought but didn’t get a promise that the Michael Reese hospital structures, site of the proposed Olympic Village, wouldn’t be demolished before Chicago knows if it won the bid.

The meeting was part of Chicago 2016’s neighborhood-level push for support. Tuesday’s session covered the 3rd, 4th and 20th wards.

A who’s who of politicians representing the South Loop as well as Near and Mid-South areas attended, including Alds. Dowell, Preckwinkle and Cochran; State Sens. Hunter, Dunkin and Raoul; and State Rep. Burns.

The meeting was chaired by Pat Ryan, CEO of the Chicago 2016 committee.

“The very small risk that any city money would be used is far outweighed by the enormous economic impact the Games will have,” Ryan said. “It is an historic opportunity. We’re very close to that. It can improve our city for generations to come.”

Officials from Chicago 2016, the committee organizing the bid, promised transparent contracting, opportunities for small business and affordable housing in the Olympic Village after the Games are over.

Other benefits promoted by the bid committee include new infrastructure dollars and increased tourism, especially by visitors from abroad.

Chicago 2016’s budget projections call for $3.8 billion in revenues and $3.3 billion in costs on the operating side; the Civic Federation is examining their assumptions and projections, said Lori Healy, a leader of Chicago 2016.

Ryan said details about an insurance policy covering cost overruns would be debuted in early September in city council.

The committee agreed to buy the policy after Mayor Richard Daley promised the IOC this summer that the city would sign the standard host city contract, potentially putting taxpayers on the hook to absorb unanticipated costs.

Some in the crowd wanted assurances that they would get a piece of the action, should the International Olympic Committee choose Chicago on Oct. 2.

“I want to make sure the 30 percent set-aside for minority or people-of-color businesses, that that is indeed something that is going to happen,” one woman said. “Let’s face it: There’s going to be a lot of revenues that’s going to be generated from this, and I want to make sure I can get my share.”

Another supporter who spoke up was Avis LaVelle, a Hyde Park resident.

LaVelle, a former spokeswoman for Mayor Daley, said the Games would spark much-needed development on neglected South Side streets. She cited 55th between the Dan Ryan to Washington Park as an example.

“This is going to be a catalyst for something to happen. Now, I know there are a lot of people here who doubt that something will happen good, residual-benefits wise, from the Olympics,” LaVelle said. “If it fails to happen, it’s not a failure of the people on the stage alone. It’s a failure of all of us.”

Speaking to reporters after the meeting, Ryan said the ward-by-ward meetings strengthened the bid. And with just a few more of the meetings left, Ryan sees the “very significant majority” of Chicagoans backing the Games.

“The support has been strong — the reports back to the aldermen are strong.” he said. “Many people who are for it don’t say anything.”

But Ald. Pat Dowell (3rd) said there still are questions that the Games could be pulled off as promised, with the benefits distributed to more than “the usual suspects.”

“I have questions about the city’s ability to get those things done, to actually bring those benefits home to the people who live in my ward, and who live in other wards affected by the Olympics,” Dowell said.

She declined to comment on reports about Michael Scott’s West Side development proposal.


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By Valerie F. Leonard from North Lawndale
Posted: 08/16/2009 9:58 PM

Unless there's a private developer willing to absorb infrastructure costs, the City is already out of $1 billion, which is included in the $4.8 billion cost estimate. This exceeds the combined $500 million guarantee from the City and the State's $250 million guarantee. Lori Healey was quoted in a 2006 Crain's article indicating that the Games would cost $1 billion. The $4.8 billion cost estimates were generated in 2006 and 2007, according to documents produced by Chicago 2016.