Vote nears on children's museum move

When rookie Alderman Brendan Reilly was elected to the City Council, his game plan was simple: keep his head down, his mouth shut and just do the work.

So much for plans.

Reilly has spent much of his first year making headlines in a feud with powerful Mayor Richard Daley over a proposal to relocate the Chicago Children's Museum to Grant Park, a renowned lakefront green space in Reilly's ward.

"This is not how I saw my first year in office going," said Reilly, who argues the park -- which attracts tourists and residents alike -- is protected lakefront land that was designated long ago as "forever open, clear and free."

The 50-member City Council may decide as soon as Wednesday, in a vote that could boil down to a quintessentially Chicago question: Do they give the influential Daley what he wants? Or do they honor a tradition of allowing aldermen to have say about development in their wards?

Reilly, a former telcommunications executive who also has worked for Illinois House Speaker Michael Madigan and failed Democratic gubernatorial candidate Paul Vallas, quickly found out what happens to those who defy the mayor.

After Reilly gave an impassioned speech to fellow aldermen last fall, Daley lashed out in an angry tirade, implying that opponents -- including many of Reilly's constituents -- didn't want poor and minority children in the tony neighborhood near the north end of the park, where museum officials proposed building the $100 million structure.

"It's a fight for the future of this city. That is why I am very strong on this. ... This is worth fighting for. If we don't fight for our children, who are we going to fight for?" Daley said at the time.

Some opponents, in turn, have accused the mayor of catering to the wishes of the museum's wealthy supporters, rather than to those of city residents.

The mayor-appointed plan commission and the City Council's zoning committee have signed off on the plan, although neither voted unanimously. On the zoning committee, some of Reilly's fellow aldermen said aldermanic prerogative shouldn't apply in this case.

Museum officials say they've outgrown their home at Navy Pier and contend their plan would do little to alter Grant Park's open space because the new facility would be built mostly underground in an area where there's now a parking garage. They also say a centrally located downtown park would be more accessible to all the city's children.

But museum president Jennifer Farrington worries about potential harm to the museum because of the public tussle over where it should be located.

"Nobody likes to be in the middle of a controversy," she said.

It's not the first time the mayor has gone toe to toe with an alderman, and challenging him is not something any alderman does lightly.

"It's not always easy because you know the political culture in this city is to defer to the mayor on just about every issue imaginable," said North Side Alderman Joe Moore.

He should know. Moore took on the mayor -- and eventually lost -- on issues that included outlawing the duck liver delicacy foie gras to requiring mega-retailers to pay higher wages to their employees.

Although the City Council originally passed a foie gras ban, sponsored by Moore, Daley last month presided over a vote to repeal the ban, which the mayor called the "silliest" ordinance ever passed.

And two years ago, Daley used his first-ever veto to stop another ordinance Moore sponsored that would have required big retailers like Wal-Mart to pay their workers more. The ordinance died when aldermen couldn't muster enough votes to override Daley.

Even so, aldermen appear less afraid to defy the mayor's wishes than in the past.

Unlike the old days at City Hall, Daley has fewer ways to punish those who challenge him because the political patronage aldermen historically depended on is less blatant than when his late father, Mayor Richard J. Daley, ran the city, political consultant Don Rose said.

So the current Mayor Daley is "less scary than the old man used to be," Rose said.

Chester Buziak, who has lived in a high rise near the park for almost 30 years, said he's glad Reilly took up the charge against the museum, calling him a "wonderful man" while acknowledging the political risk he took.

"I think the mayor's probably got him on his black list," Buziak said.

Daley says there's no hard feelings.

"I may differ with people but if I hated people I would not be your mayor," Daley said Monday.

Reilly is hoping enough of his colleagues honor the unwritten code in the city that says aldermen have say over the development in their wards, even though he acknowledges that Grant Park is a city -- not just a neighborhood -- park.

"I hope that some of my colleagues will be sensitive to the fact that they could be next if this happens to me," he said.

But Moore predicts the recent foie gras repeal that went down without debate -- despite him shouting his objections -- is a sign of how Daley will tolerate deliberations when the children's museum comes up.

"I think the mayor was trying to send a very strong signal that he was not going to look too kindly to any dissent," Moore said.