On a recent Monday afternoon, members of a group called Concerned Citizens of Riot Fest in Douglas Park guided a visitor around the west-side green space they say was disfigured by the three-day music festival last fall. Eight months after the fest, the south end of Douglas Park—bounded by Ogden, Albany, 19th, and California and occupied by soccer and baseball fields—still displays tire ruts and wide, muddy areas where heavy foot traffic from 135,000 festgoers tore up the turf. Although the tour took place days after the last rainstorm, pools of standing water remained on the compacted dirt.
Concerned Citizens activists say that Riot Fest should never have come to Douglas Park. They claim that Riot Fest, Mayor Rahm Emanuel, the Chicago Park District, and the local aldermen made the decision to move the event to the park with little or no input from the primarily African-American and Latino residents of the neighboring North Lawndale and Little Village neighborhoods. They’ve hosted public meetings on the subject, collected signatures on petitions against the fest, held protests, and have lobbied their aldermen and the Park District about the matter. At a 24th Ward community meeting in June 2015, the first to take place after it was announced Riot Fest would be held in Douglas Park, Concerned Citizens members displayed signs reading a 3-day binge is not an economic development plan and lawndale is a community, not a commodity
Chicago officials see things differently. Park District spokeswoman Jessica Maxey-Faulkner says that renting public land to private companies is a net positive for the city. “For private events like Riot Fest, Lollapalooza, and other ticketed festivals, event organizers must pay to use park space,” she says. “Proceeds from such events directly benefit Chicago Park District parks and programming.”
Park District CEO Michael Kelly offered up an alternative, recommending Riot Fest move the event three miles south to Douglas Park. Alderman George Cardenas of the 12th Ward and 24th Ward alderman-elect Michael Scott (he was inaugurated in May 2015) were in favor of the idea.
Riot Fest spokeswoman Heather West says that the organization has already spent $192,000 on park repairs and improvements and will be doing more this spring and summer. “Long-term improvements to preexisting park issues have now become the festival organizers’ primary focus moving forward,” she says.
The temporary jobs created by the fest are a drop in the bucket, says Tindal of Concerned Citizens, and the roughly $3,000 vendor fee is a barrier to area small businesses that might want to sell food or merchandise. Scott says he wants to see the fee lowered for local merchants, but he didn’t say whether he’s actually asked the fest to do this.
