South Lake Tahoe creating Champions Plaza

Jamie Anderson, Maddie Bowman and Hannah Teeter, all from Meyers and athletes for Sierra-at-Tahoe, competed in the Sochi Games. Photo/LTN file

By Kathryn Reed

Champions. Lake Tahoe has quite a few. And soon they will be memorialized in South Lake Tahoe.

Champions Plaza was an idea that came about after the Winter Olympics earlier this year because so many athletes from the basin competed in Russia.

Work on this plot of land by Lakeview Commons is being done now as part of the Harrison Avenue project. The corner of Highway 50 and Lakeview Avenue will become a small, circular area with a wall of champions and walk of champions.

Incorporated into the site will be artwork. But what that art will be remains to be seen.

That is because at the City Council meeting last week it was agreed the city would put out another request for proposal to artists. This is because with the first RFP they were bidding on a project without defined dimensions.

The council agreed to spend up to an additional $60,000 on the Harrison project to make the plaza. The money will come from undesignated excess reserves.

Money for the artwork will have to come from someplace else.

Five artists turned in ideas that ranged in price from $650 to $3.9 million.

A panel selected a sculpture by Mischell Riley and artwork for flags from Mark Allione. However, because the project site has been changed the sculpture would be too large for the allotted space.

Allione, who attended the meeting, said he favored the RFP process starting from scratch.

The sculpture was a three-piece granite stone monument allowing for engraving of names of champions with a sculpture atop the center stone. The flags were custom designed reflecting outdoor recreation and Olympic sports.

Mayor Hal Cole suggested the RFP be put out after the plaza is done so the artists may walk the area to have a better feel for what it will look like instead of relying on a rendering of it.

A member of the Tahoe Art League suggested a fundraiser for the project include the sale of miniature versions of the art that will be incorporated into the plaza.

Still to be determined is exact criteria for who gets included in the Champions Plaza.