Mon, May 26, 2003
Group Seeks $22,000 For Missed Work, Expenses
It's more and more like the kind of melodrama you'd see if the
Discovery Wings Channel ran soap operas. As the court battle over
the midnight destruction of Meigs Field by Chicago Mayor Richard
Daley continues at the speed of sludge, aircraft owners whose
planes were stranded when the runway was bulldozed want to be
reimbursed for expenses incurred in the wake of the bulldozing.
"I did put in for reimbursement and have not been reimbursed,"
said pilot Carl Cadwell, 59, who owns a medical equipment company
and lives in rural Washington state, in an interview with the
Chicago Sun-Times. "That was one of my projects for next week: to
say it's been long enough." Cadwell says he's out about $500 - the
cost of a plane ticket for a colleague to fly commercial from San
Diego to Chicago. They'd originally planned to fly in Cadwell's own
aircraft, but it was stuck on the ramp at Meigs.
Tom Komer wants ten times that amount. He's a management
consultant who makes about $2500/day. He's billing Mayor Daley
$5496.83 and most of it, he says, are lost wages. "I'm going to
wait until it's 60 days, then I'm going to start bugging them like
any other client."
Chicago's Response
"There are only seven pilots that have requested to date . . .
those who have provided supported documentation [such as receipts]
are being processed," said Chicago Aviation Department spokeswoman
Monique Bond.
A total of 16 planes were stranded at Meigs when, under cover of
darkness, Mayor Daley ordered the runway at Meigs destroyed -
without public hearings and without giving the stranded pilots a
chance to fly away.
Cadwell, the medical equipment company owner, says, if he
doesn't get his money, he probably won't sue. "If it came out of
Daley's pocket I would go after it with a vengeance," he said. "But
it doesn't. It's the citizens of Chicago that have to pay for this
skulduggery."
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