Obama breaks ground on presidential center in Chicago after lengthy discord

More than four years after leaving office, Barack Obama broke ground Tuesday on his presidential center on the South Side of Chicago, a legacy project that has been bogged down by a lengthy discord over its use of a public park and its potential impact on a historically neglected part of the city.

In an hourlong ceremony that was scaled down because of the coronavirus pandemic, Barack Obama and Michelle Obama, the former first lady, scooped up dirt with commemorative shovels at the 19-acre site in Jackson Park, near the shores of Lake Michigan.

“This day has been a long time coming,” Barack Obama said. “The pandemic had other plans, so we’re keeping this small for now.”

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Barack Obama, 60, a Democrat who left office in January 2017, said that the presidential center would become a catalyst for job growth and economic development in the place where he came of age as a politician, husband and father. The project, he said, would also turn Chicago’s South Side into a destination not just for people to learn about his presidency but also for future leaders.

“Chicago is where I found the purpose that I had been seeking,” said Barack Obama, who in 2008 became the first Black person elected to the U.S. presidency.

In a departure from similar projects recognizing former presidents, the center won’t actually be a presidential library. It won’t house Barack Obama’s presidential papers, which will be digitized — a decision that has been a sore point for some presidential observers. He envisioned that the center would host concerts, cultural events, lectures, trainings and summits.

Construction of the presidential center, whose estimated price tag has soared from initial projections of $500 million to $830 million, is expected to take four years.

A 235-foot “museum tower” will be the focal point of the center. Words taken from Barack Obama’s 2015 speech marking the 50th anniversary of the civil rights demonstrations in Selma, Alabama, will wrap around the tower’s exterior to create a sunscreen. The center will include a Chicago Public Library branch, a great lawn, a children’s play area, a fruit and vegetable garden, and a teaching kitchen.