DuPage Co. board chaiman: This day had to come

DuPage County Board Chairman Robert Schillerstrom was once an ally in the battle against O'Hare expansion.

That changed in January 2003 when DuPage leaders reversed direction and endorsed the O'Hare Modernization Program.

Schillerstrom found himself in the crosshairs of O'Hare expansion opponents who blamed him for the county board abandoning its decades-old opposition to airport expansion based on Chicago's offer to provide land for a western access road to the airport.

On Monday, Schillerstrom said he's pleased that Bensenville has ended its legal battle with Chicago.

"Given enough time, I knew this day would happen because it (O'Hare expansion) made sense," he said. "It creates so much opportunity, so many jobs and so much economic investment, that I knew that, at some point, the leadership in Bensenville would recognize how good it would be for their community and the entire region.

"It just felt to me that if we continued to just maintain the status quo and be against this, that it was going to hurt our community and the region," Schillerstrom said. "That just made no sense to me."

Wood Dale Mayor Ken Johnson, whose community long ago left the group that battled O'Hare expansion, the Suburban O'Hare Commission, said he'd still prefer expansion not happen. "But since it is, we're preparing ourselves to take full economic benefit of the expansion and western access."

Joe Karaganis, the attorney who used to represent Bensenville, claimed it's unlikely Chicago will have enough money to complete the O'Hare project. So Schillerstrom and other county leaders reversed their positions for nothing.

Schillerstrom strongly disagrees.

"I believe that the western terminal will be built, that O'Hare expansion will take place, that western access will take place," he said, "and that thousands of jobs will be created and billions of dollars will come into our local economy because of it."