Will County officials, Jackson just don’t get it

by Carol Henrichs

Dueling airports continues as a compromise falls flat. Do these players not get it?

Is it ego that makes U.S. Rep. Jesse Jackson, Jr., D-Chicago, unable to admit that Will County officials have rejected his ideas?

They see past his effort to call moving a runway on a map as a compromise. His new map says nothing about financing, building, and governing the airport, the red meat of the proposal.

It is all about who gets to control the contracts at a new airport; who can give their political pals the best jobs; who can make the decisions that guarantee reelections and political favors. It has really never been about airport capacity, though it has been disguised that way. If airport capacity were truly the issue, Gary/Chicago would be bursting at the seams.

Then there are the Will County officials. They don’t get it either. They are fortunate to have U.S. Rep. Jerry Weller, R-Morris, in their corner, even though his political prowess has been diluted by a Democrat majority in the House. But at least Weller has the political know-how to battle with Jackson. Weller has pulled more than one 11^th hour rabbits-out of-a-hat. He knows how to push the envelope when it really needs pushing.

Will County is lucky to have him. Jim Moustis, R-Frankfort, Will County Board Chairman reportedly gave what could be deemed the quote of the week.

In reference to simply moving a runway in Jackson’s new compromised plan, Moustis said, “an airport layout plan is a sophisticated document that can't be changed at a moment's notice.

"What do they think they're doing, buying a used car?" he asked.

Where has Moustis been? The entire airport study process has been predicated on that very same kind of fly-by-the-seat-of-the-pants reaction.

IDOT consultants TAMS, now Earth-Tech and its sub-consultant the al Chalabi Group, the husband and wife team that have been writing and rewriting the airport plan over the past nearly thirty years, using base information from the dawn of the jet age, have made so many assumptions, theories, and guesses that have been just enough to limp the process along.

As the late State Sen. Aldo DeAnglis, a decision-maker on this very issue, once explained that he relied on the executive summary because he never read the voluminous reports. Have any of the decision-makers read the reports?

Moustis then claimed that Jackson's changes could delay the airport planning process because a new public hearing and comment period would be required before the new plan could go forward to the Federal Aviation Administration. Delay the planning process; was he kidding?

Or is yet another bout with the angry public what is so distasteful?

What kind of naïveté would cause Will County officials to be unable to imagine the governor, who has been criticized for not taking a leadership role on the airport, giving in to Jackson’s compromise and submitting the new plan?

Then again, does Jackson think the governor will fall for his new map which solves only one component – the airport layout plan. The governor is probably wise enough to realize that Jackson’s new map does nothing to solve the most important issues of governance, construction, decision-making, financing of a road network, and many other issues.

Why should Blagojevich do anything? What is really changed?

Consider that Blagojevich just got elected. He already appeased both sides, albeit it minimally, by not pulling the plug on the proposal. If a compromise really could be reached, he would be the beneficiary. He could claim jobs and economic development — bonus points in the political world.

But what does he have to lose if they don’t work it out? In this case, the opposite of winning, isn’t necessarily losing.

Besides, Blagojevich has bigger fish to fry that will earn him much more political capital, such as school funding.

If he solves the school funding issue, he will not have to worry about political payback for years. Everybody would be happy.

The governor must consider much more than Will County and the south suburbs. He is also responsible for the entire state, which includes the City of Chicago, all of its suburbs and as well as downstate.

Perhaps Aeronautics Director Susan Shea, who refuses to return numerous phone calls, said it best.

Shea likened the politics involved as being “like a chessboard.”

If both sides continue along the same path, why couldn’t the governor simply declare this game of chess, a stalemate?