Chopping down Jackson Park trees shouldn’t be taken lightly

The arbitrary cutting down of mature trees in the “Jackson Park Historic Landscape District and Midway Plaisance,” which is posted in the National Register of Historic Places, is no trivial matter.

It was to facilitate construction of the disputed Obama Center project that is the subject of a lawsuit pending in federal court, which they have continually attempted to stall while they engage in their arboreal blitzkrieg.

It is a calculated corrupt act in defiance of the court hearing the case and the protections of our legal justice system. Why do defendants and their legal advisers need to rely on these kinds of shenanigans if their position had any merit?

Hundred-year-old trees cannot be replaced in the lifetime of any Chicago resident living today. For these public officials to commit such an irremediable act without even a thought about permitting the presiding judge in the matter to hear and decide their fate is further evidence of an egoistic exercise of power and miscarriage of justice that the Park District and mayor have engaged in from the very beginning to achieve their illegal ends.

It is telling that these defendants, fearing to answer the complaint against them, knowing the legal sanctions for false pleading, have continued to stall in court while freely tearing up Jackson Park to create irreversible fait accompli on the ground.

It’s crystal clear, they have no shame!

Herb Caplan, president, Protect Our Parks, Lake View