Obama’s presidential library ripped as ‘ugly waste of taxpayer resources’ by Chicagoans

FILE - In this May 3, 2017, file photo, former President Barack Obama speaks at a community event on the Presidential Center at the South Shore Cultural Center in Chicago. Construction is expected to start in 2018 on Barack Obama's presidential center in Chicago. The former president used his first public appearances since leaving the White House to visit his hometown several times in 2017 and reveal post-presidency plans to work with young people and details about the center. (AP Photo/Nam Y. Huh, File)

By Bradford Richardson - The Washington Times - Monday, January 29, 2018

Chicagoans in droves are venting their displeasure with President Barack Obama’s planned library, calling it an “ugly waste of taxpayer resources” and a “dangerous precedent” for the preservation of historic public parklands.

Recent letters to the editor published in the Chicago Tribune have overwhelmingly panned the Obama Presidential Center, which will take nearly 20 acres from historic Jackson Park and cost taxpayers $100 million in renovations to the surrounding area.

In a letter published on Jan. 26, John Deal of Dolton, Illinois, called the egg-shaped main tower and surrounding buildings “garish monstrosities that ruin the aesthetics of the surrounding parkland stolen from the taxpaying public.”

“Does anyone else think the artist’s rendering of the proposed Obama Presidential Center campus is ugly?” Mr. Deal asked.

Jerry Bruti of Chicagoexpressed outrage that the library is “taking valuable and irreplaceable park land that belongs to all the people of Chicago.”

“My suggestion: Build the Obama Presidential Center on vacant land that is not already dedicated as parkland, perhaps in an area that needs rejuvenation; and while at it, maybe spend those millions of dollars to build and endow a state-of-the-art school, library, affordable housing or other facility that the people of Chicago really need and can use to improve their quality of life,” Mr. Bruti wrote in the letter published on Jan. 28.