The issue of a third major airport in the Chicago area was described as being “the elephant in the room” Tuesday as Mayor Richard Daley met with 30 of his suburban counterparts: Everyone knew it was there, but no one was going to talk about it.
That was the agreement, anyway. But it was quickly abandoned after the session ended at McDonald’s Hamburger University in Oak Brook.
“We decided that today was not the day nor was this the forum to answer questions surrounding the airport,” said Oak Brook Village President Karen Bushy, who led a news conference after the closed-door meeting.
“For us to sit and talk over and over on the same issue would not be productive,” she said. “We will not allow it to take over our organization to the exclusion of other issues.”
Although those other issues were discussed, the airport question lurked in the background, said participants in the second meeting of the Metropolitan Area Mayors’ Caucus.
Daley and the various mayors are at loggerheads over whether to seek expansion of O’Hare International Airport or build a third regional airport, with the Peotone area considered the most likely site.
The mayors’ caucus was formed last December to give the leaders a forum for uniting to achieve common goals, such as proposing state legislation.
Education reform, federal transportation funding and the impact that air-quality controls have on economic development were among issues discussed at Tuesday’s three-hour meeting.
But after the meeting, some grumbled that Peotone Mayor Richard Benson had talked to reporters at the news conference about his support for new figures from the Federal Aviation Administration. Those numbers project that Chicago air-travel growth will be about half the average growth expected nationwide. Benson, who opposes Gov. Jim Edgar’s push for a third regional airport, had been responding to a reporter’s question.
Others who support the construction of a third airport believe the FAA numbers are far too conservative and they wanted to take up the debate with the same audience.
“They have cooked the books,” said Elmhurst Mayor Thomas Marcucci, chairman of the Suburban O’Hare Commission, which has been fighting O’Hare expansion and supporting a new airport.
The commission complained that it has not been formally invited to send delegates to the mayors caucus. The first meeting was on Dec. 2.
Later, Benson agreed that airport issues continue to hover over caucus discussions.
Bushy said that the airport will remain on the mayors caucus agenda, and that experts will speak at future meetings to provide statistics for the group to discuss.
Although the mayors may have sparred over the airport issue after the meeting, they did arrive at agreements on several issues during the session. Among them:
– The mayors agreed to push for federal reauthorization of a transportation act that distributes millions of dollars toward road-construction projects. The Intermodal Surface Transportation Efficiency Act is set to expire May 1, and officials fear that even if it is reinstated, some of their local control over projects will be removed.
– The mayors will push for continued state education reform, seeking less of a burden on taxpayers and more efficient ways to hold schools accountable.
– Daley proposed that the municipalities seek recognition as a unified region for adding any new open space, such as parkland, as it pertains to air-quality control laws. He proposed working with government environmental agencies that measure air quality in hopes of improving the region’s image for economic development. “We are competing with other states on expanding businesses,” Daley said, adding that companies may opt to move elsewhere.
– The group agreed to seek authority for charging cell phone users a 75-cent to $1.25 surcharge for dialing 911 outside Chicago, which already charges for 911 calls.
