Letter: Does the Obama center belong in Jackson Park? Readers discuss.

To the editor: Per “The Obama center and Chicago’s next mayor,” the editorial charitably calls the recently halted tree-felling for Obama center-related construction an “unforced error” on the part of the city. Actually, there’s a bigger “unforced error” that will no doubt continue to plague the construction of the Obama Presidential Center: the decision to confiscate public parkland, listed in the National Register of Historic Places, to build it.

As has been well-documented, there is ample available vacant and city-owned land, including an 11-acre parcel adjacent to Washington Park and mass transit that would better suit that purpose. Those options would present much less of a regulatory challenge, especially at the federal level, which has already led to considerable preconstruction delays.

We agree with the editorial that “the center is far from a slam-dunk.” One wonders, then, why the Obama Foundation would choose such a fraught path. Perhaps now is the time for the University of Chicago, which has extensive (and growing) land holdings proximate to Jackson Park, to make public its successful bid to host the center. Why is the Obama Foundation so willing to go to bat for the University of Chicago? And what happened to the president who once proudly declared, “Conservation has been a cornerstone of my presidency”?

— Charles A. Birnbaum, president and CEO, The Cultural Landscape Foundation