“The Olympics can no more have a deficit than a man can have a baby.”
Mayor Jean Drapeau of Montreal, Quebec Province, Canada (1970)
Barack Obama modestly announced that he was looking forward to Chicago’s
hosting the 2016 Olympics which would coincide with the final year of his second
presidential term. Obama also waxed melodically about how the new stadium
near Washington Park would be only a short distance from his palatial home
(alternatively known as “The House that Rezko Bought” to discerning sports
fans). Senator Obama was merely paying homage to his patron, Mayor Richard M.
Daley, by touting the Olympics.
Apparently, none of the besotted followers of Obama have stopped to
contemplate the oxymoronic character of seeking to nominate and elect a reform
politician who was nonetheless a product of the Chicago Regular Democratic
Machine. Still I live and hope to see the Olympic Games of 2016 played in Tokyo. I
have seen the future and it means higher taxes and unlimited political graft
should Chicago be selected to host the pageant.
Daley’s adherents are salivating at the prospect of the massive public works
programs that hosting the Olympics would entail. Construction contractors
would have a field day and the well connected builders would have to kick back
big bucks to their political patrons. Concessionaires favored by City Hall are
equally elated. But what about the taxpayers? Initially, Mayor Daley
pledged that Chicago taxpayers need not spend a single penny to further his
Olympic fantasies. The selection committee for the 2016 games had other ideas and
the City Council agreed to pledge $500 million dollars towards the cost of
holding the international track and field events. The committee said that $500
million was a good opening bid, but suggested that Chicago had to be prepared
to up the ante quickly. Insurance executive Patrick Ryan, who previously
raised the money to remodel and rename Northwestern University’s Dyche Stadium in
Evanston after himself, is Daley’s point man on the Olympics bidding war.
Chicago would have to build a brand new Olympic Stadium because its previous
track and field arena, Soldier Field, was seized by aliens from a distant
planet who reduced its seating capacity over the course of decades from its
original 74,000 to 61,500 and landed a space ship on its columns and forfeited
its historical landmark status in the process. Joking aside, the original
Grant Park Municipal Stadium, which was constructed by the old South Park Board,
was a costly public works boondoggle from the get go. The Los Angeles
Coliseum was built on a larger scale using almost identical architectural plans for
millions less than its smaller Chicago counterpart. I guess that there were
fewer politicians to grease in Los Angeles than in Chicago.
Los Angeles has been able to successfully host the summer Olympics twice
(1932 and 1984) by virtue of its spending slightly less than one million dollars
on its original stadium during the Twenties. Within a decade, expanded
seating eventually raised the total cost to $1.7 million. Chicago, on the other
hand, has lavished over $8.5 million on its original stadium structure.
According to James L. Merriner, author of the fine book “Grafters and Goo Goos,”
with upgrades and improvements, the cost of the renamed Soldier Field soared to
$13 million by 1939. Two of the principal names associated with the stadium
were Edward J. Kelly, the former parks and sanitary district boss who later
served fourteen years as mayor, and Mayor Richard J. Daley’s handpicked park
district superintendent, Edmund Kelly (both men are no relations to the
author).
During my travels, I have spent some time in Canada. Although it was a nice
place to visit, I am not at all sure that I would want to live there.
Canadians live under a socialist government regime that requires a constant infusion
of taxes, small and large, to pay for its ambitious government sponsored
programs. Most of my visits have been confined to two provinces, Ontario and
Quebec. The high cost of living in Canada is readily appreciated by those with
direct access to the American border. Many Canadians make monthly shopping
trips to the USA to dodge the confiscatory sales taxes imposed by their own
country. Retail merchants in places such as Windsor, Ontario have complained that
the monthly exodus of shoppers has left them with unsold goods on their store
shelves. Everything costs more in Canada and those who can commute are
stretching their Loonies and Twoonies (the Canadian dollar is a coin featuring a
loon on its reverse side and there is also a two dollar coin in use) by taking
day trips.
Until I visited Canada, I was unaware that many of our neighbors are reduced
to leading more austere and frugal lives simply because they have far less
disposable income than do Americans. Bear these facts in mind, the next time
leading Democratic politicians promise to reform the American economy and
health care system by adopting a model resembling Canada. “Change that you can
believe in” may leave you with little or no change in your pockets.
One specific memory that stands out in my recollections of Canada was my
visit to Montreal. I had gone to this historic city with the intention of taking
in a baseball game. My trip to Olympic Stadium was educational to say the
least. The Montreal Expos had moved from Jarry Park, a converted tennis stadium
with the smallest seating capacity in the National League that the expansion
team called its home for approximately eight years, to the stadium built for
the twenty-first Olympiad. The move was intended to realize a savings from
the municipal expenditures that accompanied Montreal’s acting as the host city
for the 1976 Olympic Games.
Montreal had a long tradition of supporting professional baseball. For many
years, the Montreal Royals were the top farm club for the Brooklyn Dodgers in
the International League. Storied players such as Jackie Robinson, Roy
Campanella and Duke Snider completed their minor league apprenticeships in
Montreal.
When the Dodgers departed from Ebbets Field and settled in Los Angeles, the
minor league relationship with Montreal ended. Nevertheless, within a decade,
spurred by the success of the World’s Fair of 1967
(“Expo ’67”), Montreal was elated to find itself awarded a major league
franchise of its very own. The future looked bright and the new team proved to
be immensely popular despite its regular losses on the baseball diamond.
Gradually, however, the team began to improve with new players.
The Olympic Stadium proved somewhat less of a success as the project was
plagued by construction delays and cost overruns. The Olympic Games failed to
repeat the financial success of the World’s Fair and the city shouldered the
debts. Still, there was always the promise of the stadium turning a profit once
the fast improving Expos relocated to the Olympic Stadium.
It proved to be a slowly unfolding disaster of sorts. Montreal fielded
several strong teams, but failed to win a pennant in the unfriendly multipurpose
stadium that it shared with a Canadian football team, the Montreal Alouettes. A
plan to equip the stadium with a retractable dome proved unsuccessful as the
suspension cables connected to the plastic roof never operated correctly and
the roof leaked like a sieve. The dome remained closed at all times as a
result. The cavernous and sterile facility soon became an embarrassing white
elephant. Local residents began to refer to the Parc Olympique as “The Mistake”
or “The Big Owe” as its shoddy constructions and falling concrete required
more and more dollars to fix and maintain.
As for the game that I attended, I remember a few thousand discontented
baseball fans dividing their time between watching the Expos play their game on a
hideous artificial turf surface and following a televised hockey playoff game
on the scoreboard. The park, itself, had all of the charm of the concrete
bowels of a underground parking garage. I conversed with a local fan in the
box seats and he informed me that many Montreal fans were disappointed and
frustrated by the team’s repeated inability to win the pennant and by the drab
stadium amenities. As for the Expos failing to win the pennant, I could
immediately sympathize as a Chicagoan.
Subsequent to my visit, Montreal lost its baseball club as the Expos went
through a series of ownership changes following years of steadily declining
attendance. Eventually, the National League, itself, owned and operated the
team until new owners could be located and approved. In order to stimulate some
additional attendance, the ball club had 22 of its games shifted from Quebec
to San Juan, Puerto Rico during the 2003 season. This publicity stunt was
also a means of marketing the team for sale to a new ownership group. To my way
of thinking, the loss of the once popular baseball franchise in 2004, the
year when the Expos moved to Washington, D.C., was directly attributable to
the failure of the 1976 Olympics to produce a profit for its host city.
The mayor of Montreal responsible for promoting the Olympics, Jean Drapeau,
had reassured his constituents that “The Olympics can no more have a deficit
than a man can have a baby.” This glib remark came to be a haunting refrain.
Eventually, the Montreal Alouettes football team vacated the stadium as well.
Olympic Stadium is now a empty mausoleum filled with unfulfilled promises and
heartbreaking memories for local sports fans. It has no tenants and 56,040
empty seats.
In December of 2006, thirty years after the XXI Olympiad, Montreal finally
retired its debt on the Olympic Stadium. After adding in construction delays,
maintenance and repairs, interest and inflation, the final cost of the stadium totaled $1.61 billion rather than $1.34 million that had been the initial projected cost that the promoters had publicized to the taxpayers in 1970 (nota bene, all figures represent costs expressed in Canadian dollars).
As for this Chicagoan, when it comes to hosting the 2016 Olympic Games,count me out. If I am in the mood for bread and circuses, I will stick to the corner bakery and Ringling Brothers.
**
Daniel J. Kelley is a regular contributor to “The Chicago Daily Observer” and an avid baseball fan.
LAL says:
The cost far out weighs the benefit. Ask any body who survived the LA games. The traffic was a nightmare during the games. Chicago and Illinois would have to spend 10’s of millions of dollars to upgrade our roads and public transit systems when the state is deep in red ink.
Finn K says:
Very timely article. When you read of projects in Chicago you can allways expect certain key words or phrases to go along with it such as kickbacks, influence peddling, political favors and cost overruns. Here is one example of politics as usual that support the writers assertions. As reported last week thru the major media outlets we have a transit project that has blown thru its funds and will require massive additional funds to complete. The project was reported as technologically outdated and will require large modifications to meet what it was required to do. This infrasturure project was especially touted as something that was needed to help draw the olympics. Which connected firm will get the contract to fix this mess?
On a smaller note, not related to the olympics, an Alderman on the north side sent a letter to the residents in his ward trying to rebuke a series of articles that exposed ethically questionalble practices, although apparently legal, involving his actions while in office and the benifits that arose to his wife.
What a city, nothing ever changes except the size and complexity of the schemes to take money from the taxpayers.
B. DeBarnone says:
To me the only city in need of a new Stadium and the expendtures that go along with it in the USA is NOLA.
You could revive the name of the stadium you referenced in your story, DYCHE, as the sturcture would be in corporated into the design of current levy system serving 2 ends: Refortification of the weak & failing levies and some seats to watch the events as they run through the superfund site that is now NOLA. My money would be on the runners from the high mountains of Kenya as the below sealevel NOLA air advantage to their lungs makes them a shoe in.
It could be built in an arc shape with the open end viewing the southeast. Thus all seats would be suitable for sale for the next visiting hurricane as the views will be fantastic.
thecell says:
You mean you do not like the toilet bowl to the gods?
The "thrill" of being in the upper deck, other people who are not sox fans had to pay big bucks for such thrills. (although it did get better when they got rid of some rows)
but if the combine were not so corrupt 2016 might be a good idea?
K-man says:
Sad that the major papers are to afraid of Daley to suggest he is wrong. The only reason I can see that the papers are not against it is that they are waiting to write the stories exposing the favors and large amounts of profit that will flow like waste water after a strong storm into the basements of taxpayers homes. Who knows how many of those with ties to city hall will profit with the construction and related public works that will be created. Lets be realistic, the profits a few get will never cover the costs that will be left to be paid for by John Q. Public. After all is said and done he will declare he has done all he can to make the city world class and will move to a Michigan retirement estate with a pardon from whoever the Govenor is for all past sins, known or unknown.
Pat Hickey says:
As a Chicago resident/homeowner and taxpayer - the cost of hosting the Olympics here will far, far outweigh any benefit to most Chicagoans.
The Olympics will make Pat Ryan and his pals( Aon Insurance ? Any Underwritering for the events?) much more wealthy than he already happens to be an Chicago will be a smoking hole in the ground.