Tahoe tourism agencies back Olympic effort with cash
By Kathryn Reed
STATELINE – Lake Tahoe tourism agencies are doing their financial part to help bring the 2022 Winter Olympics to the region.
On Jan. 12 the Lake Tahoe Visitors Authority allocated $25,000 to the bid effort, with the North Lake Tahoe Resort Association having already committed the same amount. Each will be asked to put in another $25,000 next year. (Board member Tom Davis was absent.)
Blaise Carrig, co-president of Vail Resorts mountain division, made a pitch to the LTVA board at the Thursday board meeting. Carrig, who the day before officially became a board member of the Reno-Tahoe Winter Games Coalition, first worked with the team when he worked at Heavenly Mountain Resort.
Blaise Carrig
“It would be a really good legacy project for Reno-Tahoe,” Carrig told the LTVA. “It would bring national and international recognition to the marketplace that Reno-Tahoe could use.”
It will take more than $1 million to put the bid together, so the tourism agencies’ checks are just a start. Nevada has pledged money. Private and public entities are being asked to be part of the process.
The bid would have to be ready to be presented to the U.S. Olympic Committee by March 2013, summer at the latest. The International Olympic Committee picks the host city in 2015. That gives the city and/or region seven years to get everything together.
“When Salt Lake City was awarded the bid, in those seven years it went from 25th to No. 1 for getting funding for infrastructure,” LTVA board member Nancy McDermid said. “This would be one way in seven years to get infrastructure we haven’t had.”
Roads, transit and venues are all things that would come to the region.
Carrig said venues have been scoped out, but nothing is solidified. Earlier he told Lake Tahoe News it is possible Heavenly could create a new run to accommodate the men’s downhill.
Without being able to accommodate that event, sources have told Lake Tahoe News, no area can host a Winter Games.
Carrig assured the LTVA board the South Shore would be part of the Olympics.
He said the international committee looks for bids that are compact. In large part this has to with the media and how they cover the Games.
While Sacramento was brought up, Carrig sees it more as a gateway to Tahoe-Reno, than a venue site. But with a large arena, having ice events there has not been ruled out. Reno doesn’t have a single sheet of ice. The South Lake Tahoe Ice Arena in the past has been talked about as a training area. It has no seating to accommodate anything close to an Olympic event. The next nearest ice is in San Jose where the Sharks play. But the Cow Palace in San Francisco and Oakland arena have had skating events before.
McDermid also questioned Carrig about whether environmental groups had been approached. He said Nevada Lt. Gov. Brian Krolicki, who is heading up the Tahoe-Reno coalition, has started those talks.
“Part of the bid is what is the environmental legacy,” Carrig said.
“Legacy projects” is a phrase often heard when discussing Olympic bids. It’s what a community is left with after the two weeks. It could be roads, a stadium or less sediment reaching Lake Tahoe. The theory is those legacies would be viewed as a positive by and for the community.
Nancy McDermid seems to be the one with a clue. “What about the enviornmental groups?” If they don’t totally bend their rules all investments are a waste of $$. Seems to me they should put these groups on their committee so that moving forward is done hand in hand. Perhaps this way we would avoid lawsuits before they start.
Interesting term ‘dryclean’ uses: “if they don’t totally bend the rules”. . . actually, this bid is in danger for a couple of other reasons:
(1) to ‘dryclean’s’ point – Olympic bids since 1994 (Lillehammer, Norway), have, as their three legs: financial (can the resources be brought to bear to handle this scope & scale, (2) venue (can the location support the necessary events, winter or summer, and (3) sustainability (is the event capable of leaving a better legacy for the community’s future)
To that degree, protection is built-in to the bid, otherwise it is not accepted, so environmentalists concerns are not only mitigated, they are the considerations.
Tahoe is so used to “flinching” from environmental concerns that are not considered enough (i.e. the TRPA’s litigation issues) that they have not yet learned enough about sustainability to just include it as a part of doing business.
This will come-to-pass as everyday anyway
This is true for the region as well, as they are still in a “contractor’s model” – what is the cheapest way I can get this done, and still call myself green ?
Not only is this counterproductive to build this way (as so many do), it will doom any IOC bid, as they are much more sophisticated than is commonly realized. . .
So, Blaise calling it the “environmental legacy” is, in that sense, a little off-key . . .it’s about sustainable economic development.
To Kae’s comment about “legacy projects” can be added another insight: infrastructural issues that propel a “place” into the future, such as a multi-modal transportation system, or as a housing affordability program, that an area could not otherwise afford, are the true value of hosting an Olympics. If not, then Reno/Tahoe can just do a better job of marketing themselves, without all the expensive posturing.
As an example of the above, when this effort first got going, the discussion was to renovate Virginia Street south of the Truckee River towards athlete housing, and combine that with a monorail from Lawlor Event Center down to the Convention Center, to (1) satisfy the downtown folks, now as far south as the Convention Center, as well as downtown, and (2) to offer affordable converted athlete’s housing, while providing a better way of transit to get around town, from then on. . .
Try for as many “win/wins” as feasible.
Now, if only the USOC settles its’ feud with the IOC, then we compete with Denver…