Sources say: Obama's Library to be built in Chicago

I'm waiting to hear if I won the Design Contest ... Do You Think?

President Barack Obama has selected the University of Chicago to host his library and museum, sources have told the Chicago Tribune.

Despite a flurry of reports Thursday that Chicago had won the library, there was no official confirmation by the Obama administration, City Hall or the Obama Foundation, which is leading the site selection process.

A strip of wooded land in Washington Park, at right, and 
an adjacent vacant piece of property seen at lower left, are 
a potential location for the Obama Presidential Library 
on Chicago's South Side.

Martin Nesbitt, the foundation's president and a close friend of the president's, declined to comment Thursday night.

Last Friday, Obama called Mayor Rahm Emanuel's office to thank the mayor and the two Democratic leaders of the Illinois legislature, House Speaker Michael Madigan and Senate President John Cullerton, for fast-tracking state legislation that would authorize the use of parkland for a presidential library, said a source familiar with the conversation who was not authorized to speak publicly about it.

Unused lots near Washington Park and the CTA Green Line 
Garfield Station are one of the University of Chicago's 
proposed locations for the Obama presidential library.

Obama did not go further to indicate the library would be located in Chicago, the source said.

Sources said it remained unclear whether a decision had been made on which South Side park to build the library — Washington Park or Jackson Park.

According to one source, the official announcement could come in the next few weeks.

The president and the Barack Obama Foundation also have considered a plan, according to sources, to place the president's offices and the foundation in New York. It would be an arrangement similar to former President Bill Clinton, who built his library, museum and institute in Little Rock but operates his foundation, from which global projects are launched, in Harlem.

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