CHICAGO (WBBM NEWSRADIO) -- There’s organized opposition to putting an outdoor roller rink in a lot on Chicago’s West Side.
It' sounds innocent enough.
“Opportunities for people to mingle and be together, because you do not have that in that corridor,” 28th Ward Alderman Jason Irvin told CBS 2.
Ald. Irvin said he envisions the skate park to be an oasis in the lot at Madison and Pulaski in West Garfield Park. He said the lot would also host other activities.
“So it’s my hope that by bringing the Park District, bringing resources – Chicago Police Department and other people – that will create a safe atmosphere for our children,” Ald. Ervin said.
But, there’s opposition, because of what could happen.
Siri Hibbler, of the Garfield Park Chamber of Commerce, said it is not the place.
“We are here, totally against it,” she told CBS 2. “Shootings that go on here, drug trafficking that goes on here – all during the day – and we do not want to put our kids in harm’s way."
Alderman Irvin said he’s moving forward, despite a petition drive opposing the plan.
“I’m not going to say the fear is not justified, but we have to be greater than the fear,” Ald. Ervin said, “and we have to reclaim, and take our communities – and we cannot sit at a point where we said we will not go outside because of what’s going on outside.”
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