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The City of Chicago is putting the finishing touches on its clean up as we prepare to welcome the International Olympic Committee's evaluation commission tomorrow, their first stop on their candidate city evaluation tour. The last potholes have been filled, the last sidewalk has been pressure-washed, and the homeless have all been rounded up and temporarily relocated to an undisclosed location for the next week.
The 13-member commission will be shown the red carpet while they're in town over the next few days. Pat Ryan, Chicago 2016 CEO, is optimistic about Chicago's place as the first visit for the commission, telling the Sun-Times, "We'd rather be first than last. We can help set the bar as high as we want to...They're here six days and then they're home for a few days then they're out again. So by the time of the fourth one, they're going to be pretty tired, just physically...There's an advantage to the freshness."
The Trib's Phillip Hersh insists that the upcoming IOC visit won't win 2016 Games for Chicago, but a poor showing at the presentation could certainly lose the 2016 Games. Referring to London's dry runs before the IOC evaluation commission visited them for the 2012 Games decision (which London won), Hersh highlights the importance of being prepared.
"There are two critical things to demonstrate during the visit," Keith Mills, the chief executive of London's successful bid, said Tuesday."One is to lay to rest any criticisms raised in the first evaluation (a year earlier). The other is that how you manage the visit is as important as what you say, because if you can't manage the visit flawlessly, how can you organize the Olympic Games?"
Chicago, the first of the four finalists on the visit schedule, has done extensive dry runs and is not concerned about possible protests, Ryan said in a meeting Tuesday with the Tribune editorial board.
It's that last part which will prove tricky for the Chicago 2016 crew: there will be multiple, high visibility protests taking place this week when the IOC comes to town. Both the Fraternal Order of Police and the group No Games Chicago have planned large pickets, though the police union insists there protest - over a contract dispute with the city - is not intended to harm the city's chances of landing the 2016 Olympics. Meanwhile, Communities for Equitable Olympics, a collection of several smaller community groups announced today that they, too, would proceed with protests because, according to Chicago Breaking News, "it was upset that Mayor Richard Daley and the Chicago 2016 bid team did not secure full City Council approval for a community benefits ordinance prior to the visit."
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I think rio should get it. They've never had an olympics in latin america and they seem to actually want it.
yet the idea of an olympics here is really exciting.
i dunno, i'm torn.
I heard the FOP rep on WBEZ trying not to laugh as he said that the IOC being in town was just a coincidence.
How much money was spent on those, suddenly blooming, flowers over by Buckingham fountain. Kind of cool for such a lush garden.
Federal Plaza, 5pm tomorrow. Come on down and let your voice be heard. Even through limousine glass.
http://nogames.wordpress.com/
As of this afternoon, the barricades are set in front of the AON Center for a block or two in each direction. How big is this protest supposed to be?
You've got a nexus point really. Cops, community activists, minority advocates and just plain old angry people who don't want to pay so they can play.
I hope it's STAGGERING and it scares the IOC back under their rock.
We should all go down and video tape the cops protesting like they do to other protesters..
You can tell the city is scare of the backlash. They took out an expensive "If you want the games, let your voice be heard" ad in the papers this week (some silly thing you're supposed to clip out - a tiny dotted line with scissors on the side of the page indicated this - and post in your window I guess, and a big banner saying pretty much the same thing that I saw this afternoon as I walked through Daley plaza. They know the majority are against this, hence the backlash campaign. That should be enough for the IOC to say, "Meh" to this idea.
Actually, a March 2009 poll by Zogby International found that 78% of people supported the bid.
Excluding the mayor, the supporters simply aren't out bitching one way or the other about this, so it appears more people don't want it. And, Obama likes it!
Well, I didn't mention numbers. The exact totals are not really important. What I was commenting on is that there is apparently a significant and vocal number of opponents as far as the city is concerned, enough that they've devised a whole campaign to counter them.
What a coincidence, a shedload of potholes have been filled here in Hyde Park. My friend tells me all the monstrous holes in Washington Park have been filled as well.
Sears Tower noted that "a March 2009 poll by Zogby International found that 78% of people supported the bid."
(a) Zogby can be "wildly inaccurate".
(b) In any case, as Ben Joravsky notes:
"The mayor waves around a poll his Olympic bid committee took a year ago that found 76 percent of Chicago-area residents favor bringing the Olympics to town. But a Chicago Tribune poll taken in February found that 75 percent are against using public money to pay for them."
"And, Obama likes it!"
Given the judgment he's displayed since he's been in office, this may be sufficient reason to oppose it.
All good points.
Zogby is infamous for getting you exactly the result you pay for. I'm going to the rally today and I'd love to have the Olympics here. But I want the CTA fixed, I want a better than 50% graduation rate. I want a full force of cops with a contract. I want city hall fumigated of "da guys". I want all that a lot more than the Olympics.