The suit went to the Illinois Supreme Court, Moltz said, where the Bears and the district prevailed. Moltz said Schwartz was a named plaintiff, along with Friends of the Parks and others, in a suit attempting to stop plans by the Chicago Bears and the Chicago Park District to expand Soldier Field with what has been called the “toilet bowl” addition. He chaired the board for several years around 2000.Īnd he wasn’t through with lawsuits in what he saw as the public interest. With his expertise and what Tranter called “his passion for public benefit,” Schwartz became not only a great resource for Friends of the Parks, but a generous supporter. Eventually a court decided the museums should get $6 million and, as reported at the time, should partner with the Park District on a new bond issue of $24 million,with proceeds to eventually go to the museums. The district didn’t agree with Schwartz’s assessment. He found something in the Park District budget.” “He was a financial guy, really into numbers. “Charlie was a really smart man,” said Erma Tranter, former executive director of Friends of the Parks. In the early 1980s, Schwartz discovered about $16 million in interest earned on an earlier Park District bond issue that he and the museums on park land felt belonged to those institutions. According to his wife, retirement gave Schwartz more time to spend on what she called “his true vocation, being a civic gadfly.” Schwartz stayed with Champion until his retirement in 1993. “He was a real advocate for remanufacturing and encouraged/promoted it on a regular basis because it was an environmentally sound industry that created many jobs because it was labor intensive,” Bill Gager, who knew him in that capacity, said in an email. With Champion he became active in what is now the Automotive Parts Remanufacturers Association. In the mid-1970s, his biggest client, Champion Parts Rebuilders, then in Oak Brook, enlisted him as president. Schwartz worked for some time as an investment banker and later as a self-employed business consultant. He then got a law degree from Harvard Law School in 1950.Ĭharles Schwartz Jr., a Harvard-trained lawyer, was a longtime ally of Friends of the Parks. He enrolled in the Merchant Marine, serving on North Atlantic routes aboard the U.S.S. He attended University of Chicago Laboratory Schools from nursery school through 10th grade before going on to get his undergraduate degree from the U. “To his parents, public service was everything,” his wife said. Schwartz grew up in a household active in civic affairs. The couple lived on Chicago’s Near North Side for the past 25 years after many years spent in Hyde Park, where Schwartz grew up. Schwartz, 91, died of complications of Alzheimer’s disease on March 17 in JFK Medical Center in West Palm Beach, Fla., according to his wife of 42 years, Susan. “He deeply believed in the mission of Friends of the Parks and the value of an open accessible lakefront and open parks and open space and just the inherent value of those things to the city,” said Lauren Moltz, current board chair of the organization. Schwartz, a Harvard-trained lawyer, sued the Chicago Park District in the early 1980s on behalf of eight museums, arguing the district failed to share millions of dollars in interest on a bond issue meant to provide funds to the museums. Charles Schwartz Jr., a manufacturing executive and civic activist, fought to stop the Chicago Bears from putting what he saw as an unsightly addition on Soldier Field and worked with Friends of the Parks to fend off development along the city’s lakefront.
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