Chicago’s South Side, a historic working-class stronghold, now faces an imposing shadow from the Obama Presidential Center, a project locals say is tearing at the neighborhood’s very soul.
According to Fox News, the sprawling 19.3-acre development in Jackson Park, featuring a 225-foot-tall concrete museum, is driving up rents and property taxes, pushing longtime residents toward displacement. The project, meant to honor former President Barack Obama, is instead sparking fears of cultural erasure.
Community activists and leaders argue that this isn’t revitalization but a slow eviction of the very people who built the area’s legacy. They see the center, with its Brutalist design, as an eyesore clashing with Chicago’s architectural heritage, and worse, a catalyst for economic hardship.
The Obama Foundation secured a 99-year lease on public land for a mere $10 in 2018, promising to uplift the area without displacing residents. Yet, construction costs have skyrocketed from $330 million to $830 million, with no recent updates, while progress crawls at a frustrating pace.
Obama himself stated back then that the project aimed to balance job growth and housing affordability. But locals like Alderwoman Jeanette Taylor counter that every major development historically pushes out the communities it claims to serve, and this is no exception.
“Every time large development comes to communities, they displace the very people they say they want to improve it for,” Taylor told reporters. Her push for protections like affordable housing mandates and tenant rights has yielded only partial wins, with a 2020 agreement securing just 30% affordable units on city-owned land nearby.
A proposed 250-room luxury hotel near the site, backed by an investment firm led by Allison Davis, Obama’s first boss after law school, has become a lightning rod for criticism. Residents fear its approval, still under review, will signal to investors that the area is pivoting toward wealthier outsiders.
Property values often spike after such projects, and rents have already jumped from $850 to $1,300 in some cases, as noted by activist Dixon Romeo at a recent protest. Demonstrations continue as locals demand that the hotel plan be scrapped to preserve the neighborhood’s character.
“When you got people’s rent going from $850 to $1,300, you’re telling people you don’t want them in the neighborhood,” Romeo said. Such stark numbers reveal a disconnect between the project’s lofty goals and the gritty reality on the ground.
Taylor and others have long demanded a binding Community Benefits Agreement (CBA) to ensure affordable housing, local hiring, and other safeguards, but the city failed to secure one before construction began. Without it, small landlords face rising property taxes, forcing rent hikes that burden tenants.
“The city of Chicago should have done a Community Benefits Agreement before the first shovel went into the ground,” Taylor insisted. Her frustration echoes a broader sentiment that the project prioritizes prestige over people.
Residents like Ken Woodward, an attorney who grew up nearby, call the center a “monstrosity” that disrupts Jackson Park’s once-serene landscape. “It looks like this big piece of rock that just landed here out of nowhere,” he said, capturing a shared dismay at both its aesthetics and impact.
The center, set to include a digital library, conference spaces, a gymnasium, and an NBA-sized court, also houses the Obama Foundation, which oversees its development. Yet, its scale and design draw scorn, with activist Kyana Butler lamenting it as “pretty huge and monstrous” and far too costly for what it delivers.
Tyrone Muhammad, a community leader, dubbed it “the Tower of Babel,” while noting property tax hikes so severe that some building owners might abandon their properties. He stops short of blaming Obama directly but questions the intentions of the team steering this juggernaut.
Even as a $40.75 million lawsuit over racial bias in contracting highlights internal strife, and President Donald Trump offers help while criticizing the project’s focus on diversity quotas over merit, the core issue remains: a neighborhood losing its grip. South Side residents aren’t just fighting a building; they’re battling to keep their history from being paved over by progress that seems to forget who it was meant to serve.
