Future U.S. Olympic bid in limbo
By Reno Gazette-Journal
A decade has passed since Apolo Anton Ohno, Derek Parra and Sarah Hughes took their golden turns on the Salt Lake City Olympic ice; since U.S. men swept snowboard medals in a Utah halfpipe; since Vonetta Flowers rode a Park City bobsled run to history, becoming the first black Winter Games champion.
In those 10 years, the U.S. Olympic Committee has tried twice to bring another Olympics to U.S. soil.
And failed miserably.
As Salt Lake City marks the 10th anniversary of its Games — the opening ceremony was on Feb. 8, 2002 — U.S. Olympic bid ambitions are on hold while the USOC and the International Olympic Committee jockey over revenue sharing.
The earliest the USA could host another Olympics is 2022, when a Winter Games will be held. It could be much later.
“We’re not considering a winter or a summer bid right now,” says Scott Blackmun, the USOC’s chief executive officer.
That’s nothing to panic over, says Jon Killoran, CEO of the Reno-Tahoe Winter Games Coalition, which hopes to make a bid to bring the Winter Games to Reno-Tahoe in 2022. It’s part of the Olympic process, which often takes time.
“We’ve stated all along that the USOC has been very succinct in what they need to accomplish with the IOC in terms of a revenue-sharing agreement,” Killoran said. “We support and understand that process, and we continue to prepare ourselves so that at the appropriate time, when the USOC wants to move forward with the bid process, we can be ready to do that.”
Killoran said it was in 2009 when the IOC and USOC first began to negotiate the revenue-sharing agreement, and at that time they set 2013, prior to when the host of the 2020 Games will be announced (on Sept. 7, 2013) as a guideline to have an agreement in place.
Not having a home Games on the horizon, Blackmun says, affects Olympic awareness among fans and impacts to some extent how much sponsor and donor money the USOC raises to train Olympians. Over time, it could diminish how well U.S. athletes perform.
“When we have a Games in the United States, it really connects us to the American public in a way that’s good for us and for our athletes long-term,” Blackmun says.
It is well worth the effort to keep the Reno Tahoe Olympic Bid alive. I was involved in forming the RTWGOC in the mid 1980s.I signed the original documents as Secretary of the Committee that included the Mayors, John Ascuaga, Heavenly, Squaw Valley, the President of UNR and the Governors of both states. We came close to getting the bid. We were up against France, Bulgaria, Germany, Switzerland and several others. Albertville France was represented by Jean Claude Killi and we witnessed the deal that was made with Spain by France to support each other’s bid for the winter & summer games.We learned that it is a very political process and that each individual sport has its own governing body with varying degrees of influence. With each bid attempt the Reno Tahoe effort gains knowledge, experience and allies. Once we do get the Olympics the publicity and infrastructure such as permanent bus systems will be amazing. And the huge dollops of federal funds would benefit Tahoe in every way including the environment and economy. That is in exchange for two crushing weeks of Olympic fans. That is a good trade to make.