Let the games begin.
Brazil on Friday won its bid for the 2016 Summer Olympic Games. It’s a coup for the country, and indeed the entire South American continent, which has never hosted the games.
But when we say games, we’re talking about all of the jockeying among U.S. cities that no doubt began the moment Chicago was booted from Friday’s contest. With the Windy City out of the running for the 2016 games, the race began to become the next U.S. city to host an Olympics.
Denver, which has been eyeing upcoming winter games, is likely to be in the mix. If that is the case, and we hope it is, history should serve as a guide for boosters.
We are, of course, talking about the historic snub state voters delivered to the International Olympic Committee 37 years ago when a majority rejected public funding for the 1976 Winter Games, which already had been awarded to Denver.
That vote was fueled by fears the games would generate high costs and booming population growth.
Yet, a funny thing happened on the way to not having the Olympics. We got the growth anyway, but without the infrastructure that likely would have come with hosting the games. Of course, taxpayers would have paid for those upgrades, but given the state’s chronic underfunding of infrastructure, that’s not such a bad thing.
The other result that came out of Colorado’s great Olympic rejection is that the games, by and large, began paying their own way where they hadn’t before. That is a good development. The Los Angeles Summer Games in 1984 turned a profit, which was unheard of at the time.
So why are we talking about all this history on a day when we ought to be mourning Chicago’s dashed hopes for the 2016 Summer Games, or at least questioning what the city’s rejection says about President Obama’s global influence?
Well, it’s already time for cities with Olympic aspirations to start planning.
It’s clear that the 2018 Winter Games are out of the running, since the bids are due in about two weeks and the United States Olympic Committee was adamant it wouldn’t be working on other bids while Chicago was on the world stage.
If Denver is to be one of those cities in the mix, organizers have significant hurdles to clear.
First, local interests must be included in the planning. There can be no surprises as to which sites are being pitched for different event venues.
Organizers also must have a coherent plan to make sure any local and state financial contributions are clearly defined, and acceptable to voters, before the pitch goes much further. That’s important not just to the state, but to Olympic officials, who assuredly have not forgotten the Colorado rejection of 1972.
Of course, there also will be many environmental concerns that must be addressed.
A Colorado Olympic Games would be a wonderful event for this sports-crazy state. But such an endeavor would have to be approached with clear-eyed realism rooted in this state’s complicated history with the Olympics.
