Everyone is on board with the idea that ensuring security at large public gatherings – like baseball games – is a good thing.
How best to accomplish it, who directs the particulars, and who pays for the expenses, however, are things that will probably always be debated.
So it is with Wrigley Field, its surrounding neighborhood, the Chicago Cubs, and the City of Chicago, where all sides agree that security is important, but the city is making additional demands on the Cubs for further improvements.
You can read more of the particulars about a now-public back-and-forth between the Cubs and the city here at the Tribune and the Sun-Times.
Per the reports, the city would like, among other things, for the Cubs to develop a more comprehensive security plan for the plaza and the roadways near the ballpark, while the Cubs counter that they already have done the former, and need the city to close Addison and Clark on game days to deal with the latter.
The Cubs recently sent the city $1 million for additional security cameras, have paid for their own nearly $1 billion renovation project at Wrigley Field, and have fans who pay some of the steepest ticket taxes in the country. Their position on additional expenses related to security would understandably favor the city doing more.
For the city’s part, closing Addison and Clark – both major thoroughfares in the area – on game days risks a tremendously congested traffic problem for a neighborhood that is already rough for transit on game days. For what it’s worth, at particularly busy times, the roads have already been closed with success.
What, you thought the sparring between the city and the Cubs would end when the renovations at Wrigley Field began? Or several years after that? Pfft. Never.