Chicago residents in rent-controlled housing near a site being constructed to honor former President Barack Obama have reportedly unionized in response to the controversial project.
Residents of a longtime Woodlawn apartment building organized to resist possible displacement and rent increases they say are being driven by development pressure surrounding the Obama Presidential Center.
Tenants at the Chaney Braggs Apartments rallied earlier this month outside their building near 65th Street and Stony Island Avenue, saying a potential sale of the property could upend the lives of families who have lived there for decades, called an eyesore by critics — on the eve of Juneteenth.
Juneteenth marks the day in 1865 when Union troops arrived in Galveston, Texas, and informed enslaved Black Americans there that they were free — more than two years after President Abraham Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation.
The holiday has been observed as a celebration of Black freedom, resilience and community, and in recent years has taken on broader national significance as both a commemoration of liberation and a reminder of the long struggle for racial justice in the United States.
Obama had once described the center as a "gift" to Chicago. It is a gift that keeps on costing.
A Fox News Digital investigation in February found taxpayers are absorbing hundreds of millions of dollars in related public infrastructure costs tied to the project. Those expenses include road redesigns, stormwater systems and utility relocations needed to support the 19.3-acre campus in Jackson Park. No government agency has provided a full accounting of the total public cost despite months of inquiries and Freedom of Information Act requests.
Initial projections put public infrastructure spending at about $350 million to be shared by the city of Chicago and the state of Illinois. Critics now argue those obligations have grown into a major public burden as the project has faced delays and mounting costs.
Fox News' Michael Dorgan contributed to this report.