Chicago Olympics Minority Agreement Approved Despite Vocal Opposition

The IOC is no longer in town but the debate over Chicago's Olympic bid rages on.

The City Council approved the Olympic Community Agreement Wednesday, which mandates a certain amount of Olympic-related contracts be set aside for women and minorities and that 30 percent of Olympic Village housing stock gets converted into affordable housing after the Games.

Former Illinois Senate President Emil Jones on Tuesday called the agreement ironed out by community groups and the Chicago Olympic Committee a "slap in the face," the Chicago Defender reports.

"Let me first start off by saying I am for Chicago winning the Olympics. But should the Olympics come here, Blacks would get the short end of the stick," Jones told the Defender.

Dismissing the project labor agreement a "sham" and an insult "to the very individuals and communities it alleges to benefit and protect," Jones blasted its negotiators:

"Those individuals who sat at the table didn't understand the agreement," he said. "If this is the best they can do, then they are poor negotiators."

A debate over the Olympics turned hostile Tuesday night, when supporters and opponents got into a shouting Match, ABC 7 reports:

While 2016 supporters at the meeting welcomed the potential improvements the Games will bring to the Douglas Park neighborhood, opponents argue money can be better spent on improving schools and city services.

DePaul University officials, meanwhile, have offered the school's dorms and athletic fields for athletes' use during the games, the Chi-Town Daily News reports:

DePaul University may rent out some of its dorms for the Olympic games and could even allow use of the athletic fields at its Lincoln Park campus.

Comments

[nowratan]

There will be lot of GM and Criysler dealersips and car lots available why not use them?

[47th]

The people of Washington Park will be run out of their neighborhood if Chicago gets stuck with the Olympics! That is the reason Daley wants the Olympics so badly. He wants to gentrify the South side. God, I hope any other of the three cities gets stuck with this mess. The Olympics have the potential to make Chicago look real bad!

[BVictor1]

Stop making false statements.

There's of course the posibility of property taxes increasing because of development, but a tax cap could help that issue. there are no plans to demolish buildings in the Washington Park or Woodlawn neighborhoods.

There's nothing wrong with gentrifying the southside. If you haven't noticed, there's a hell of a lot of vacant and valuble land on the southside. Is it your suggestion that the land remain empty or the buildings vacant? There needs to e more density in terms of residential and retail along major southside cooridors.

The Olympics will be a very positive thing even if people don't realize the long term benifits.

[47th]

You are drinking the Daley kool aide! The people who live in Washington Park at this time, will not benefit from these games in any way! The construction jobs will not go to the people who live there now, and the gentrification of these neighborhoods will leave more displaced, homeless people. That is what Daley's Olympic plan is all about, forcing working class Black people out of the city! Forcing working class people of any color out of the city has been at the root of the Daley administration for twenty years! Not of penny of tax dollars for this twenty first centiury brand of racism!