1. \u00a0What\u2019s the cost?<\/p>\n
2. \u00a0What\u2019s the content?<\/p>\n
The background:<\/p>\n
The Tribune is now reporting<\/a> that the library coming to Chicago is now a done deal; the only unanswered question is which major city park will have its acreage sliced off to become museum grounds, parking, the First Lady\u2019s Garden, and the like.<\/p>\n With respect to question 1, it is already apparent that, despite claims that the library will be built with private funds, there will be costs a-plenty for the city, region, and state. \u00a0The land is already being given to the Foundation free of charge. \u00a0And the Trib reports,<\/p>\n In order to strengthen the U. of C.\u2019s bid, Emanuel has promised to work with the Chicago Transit Authority and Metra to improve transportation in the area. The mayor also has committed to providing new streetscapes and landscapes in and around the library as well as the surrounding neighborhood.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n Museum boosters imagine all manner of economic development coming from the museum:<\/p>\n In the coming months, the foundation will enter into a formal partnership with the city to revitalize South Side communities around the library. Together, they will be charged with creating an economic environment that will attract supplemental businesses such as restaurants and hotels and provide road and transportation enhancement in neighborhoods that have long been neglected.<\/p>\n The University of Chicago, which will host the library, has boasted that the development would be a $600 million* economic catalyst that will revitalize neighborhoods, create commercial corridors and generate nearly 2,000 jobs.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n (*Incidentally, $600 million? \u00a0From memory, if that\u2019s referring purely to Library fundraising, that figure include the endowment that every library is expected to have, as well as the construction costs themselves.)<\/p>\n Folks, the South Side is already host to the Museum of Science and Industry. \u00a0We had a museum membership some years ago there (haven\u2019t renewed it in a while as it got much more expensive, and covers much less without a further upgrade), and our usual practice was to come in the morning, eat lunch at the food court, and leave at closing time, hopping right back onto the highway.<\/p>\n It\u2019s preposterous to imagine that a presidential museum will work wonders. \u00a0This is not the sort of museum that attracts tourists from out-of-town \u2014 at best, the usual tourists might add a day to their visit. \u00a0Hence, my suspicion about costs: \u00a0the only way these claims are anything other than pure fantasy is if there\u2019s a presumption that the government, at all levels, is going to use the occasion of the library\u2019s construction for some accompanying big-money construction projects.<\/p>\n Hence, my question: \u00a0what\u2019s the pricetag? Given the fiscal condition of Chicago, and of Illinois, the people of the city, the region*, and the state deserve to know what the bill is going to be before Emmanuel and Rauner sign on the dotted line, start issuing bonds, and otherwise sink us further into debt. \u00a0(*If Metra\u2019s expected to kick in cash for mass transit, that\u2019ll impact our train fares directly, as this is regionally-funded.)<\/p>\n And question 2: \u00a0the content.<\/p>\n I wrote about this back in January<\/a>: \u00a0presidential libraries, to the extent that they become expensive shrines to the individual and his family, quickly become white elephants, second-rate tourist destinations for rainy days, unless you can snag something pretty impressive, such as the Reagan Library\u2019s Air Force One. \u00a0With Obama, in particular, given that he just didn\u2019t have much of a story to tell prior to his rapid political rise, it\u2019s very hard to envision anything other than this. \u00a0How do you craft a museum out of first dates and community organizing, speechmaking and Obamacare, the White House Garden and Let\u2019s Move? \u00a0This is all pretty small stuff, and it would surely be an embarrassment to try to claim there\u2019s anything larger than life about it. \u00a0If, on the other hand, you try to turn Obama\u2019s story into a story of African-American history as the culmination of\u00a0the civil rights movement, you compete with the DuSable Museum<\/a>, hardly an improvement.\u00a0 At best, there\u2019s a way to center the story around civic engagement, but that\u2019s too abstract to achieve in a museum format \u2014 if all you\u2019ve got is pictures* and text, videos and interactive computer screens, you might as well put this all on a website and call it a day. \u00a0(*OK, fine, art museums are all about pictures, but not just 100-odd photos of the Obama family.)<\/p>\n The more this is a monument\u00a0to Obama and his family, the less it deserves pride of place in Chicago. \u00a0Everyone is asking about the proposed George Lucas Museum of Narrative Art: \u00a0what will it contain, really? \u00a0Will it still be a draw, or a white elephant, after Star Wars fades into a distant memory? \u00a0And the power brokers feel perfectly entitled to ask these questions as a part of the decision around whether Lucas will be allowed to build at his chosen location. \u00a0No one is asking these questions of the Obama library<\/strong> \u2014 and the people of the city and state, being asked to spend big chunks of money, indirectly if not directly, deserve answers.<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" 1. \u00a0What\u2019s the cost? 2. \u00a0What\u2019s the content? The background: The Tribune is now reporting that the library coming to Chicago is now a done deal; the only unanswered question is which major city park will have its acreage sliced off to become museum grounds, parking, the First Lady\u2019s Garden, and the like. With respect […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2209,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1881","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"\n