Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot was recently added to a lawsuit against the Chicago Park District for taking down a Columbus statue in the city in 2020.
Lightfoot was added to the Circuit Court of Cook County lawsuit because it’s “ultimately the mayor’s say” which statues must be taken down, the group that made the filing said. The lawsuit, which asks only that the statue be erected once again, was first filed by the Joint Civic Committee of Italian Americans last July against the Chicago Park District alleging that officials breached an agreement from 1973 to display the statue in Chicago’s Little Italy.
“The park district’s position is that regardless of what the contract says and regardless of what their jurisdiction covers, it’s ultimately the mayor’s say,” Ron Onesti, president of the Joint Civic Committee of Italian Americans told the Washington Examiner. “So, we brought that situation to the judge because the park district’s position is that their hands are tied, and so, our position is that the mayor has interfered with the park district’s ability to comply with the terms of the contract.”
CHICAGO MAYOR LORI LIGHTFOOT HAS COLUMBUS STATUE TAKEN DOWN IN MIDDLE OF NIGHT
In response to a request for comment, a spokesperson for the mayor’s office directed the Washington Examiner to a statement from the Chicago Department of Law.
“The City will review the filed complaint and will have no further comment as the matter is now in litigation,” the statement said.
During protests in summer 2020 sparked by the death of George Floyd, activists advocated the statue be taken down due to Columbus’s treatment of Native Americans. Lightfoot initially resisted calls to take the statue down but ultimately ordered the removal of multiple Columbus statues in the city, including the one in Little Italy.
Onesti said Lightfoot made it clear to the committee that the statue in Little Italy was meant to be taken down temporarily due to safety concerns. He said the committee did not necessarily agree with the decision to take it down but understood the situation.
But now that it has been about a year and a half since the statue was taken down, the committee wants a plan to get it back up, and no one from the mayor’s office or the park district has met with them to develop a plan, Onesti said.
The organization first filed its lawsuit against the park district in July 2021. Lightfoot was initially listed as a respondent for discovery but has now been bumped up to a defendant.
The statue was given to the city in 1958, after which it sat for about 10 years. Members of the committee paid to repair and renovate it as part of a contract with the park district. Onesti said the contract included a provision that the statue cannot be altered without the express written consent of the committee.
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Columbus has been subject to a debate over how he should be remembered due to his treatment of Native Americans. Onesti said he agrees that the full story of Columbus should be told and that the narrative about Columbus must be expanded, but he maintained that the committee is pushing back against the “cancel culture process.”
“It represents generations of traditions to a certain community that is very important to us. What started out as an Italian-American initiative has now branched out to a multiethnic initiative because what could happen to our Columbus statue could happen to any other group,” he said. “We believe in perpetuating history and telling everyone’s story.”
