David Greising, the business reporter for the Chicago Tribune, made some excellent points today: “This is a good thing for our bid,” Pat Ryan was saying the other night, after Bronzeville neighborhood citizens grilled Olympics officials for nearly three hours about costs and risks of staging a Chicago Olympics. A root-canal look on his face, …
As reported by Greg Hinz in Crain’s Chicago Business: The giant agency that runs McCormick Place and Navy Pier has had to tap the state treasury to avoid defaulting on tens of millions of dollars of bond payments. Using a special provision in state law, the Metropolitan Pier & Exposition Authority last month quietly obtained …
As reported in the Chicago Tribune: Chicago’s final fundraiser for its 2016 Olympic bid drew the biggest crowd yet, but raised only about $5 million Wednesday evening, the lowest tally of three major events aimed at luring private cash. The sum was raised from 3,600 supporters, or more than 1,000 more than attended last year’s …
As reported in the Chicago Reader by Ben Joravsky: With Mayor Daley essentially asking for a blank check to pay for the Olympics, the taxpayers of Chicago could use a little boldness from their City Council. But Manny Flores, one of the few aldermen occasionally willing to stand up for good government, seems to be …
As reported online by Yahoo News Canada: An Olympic watchdog group is asking the United Nations to send human rights observers to the 2010 Winter Games. The Impact on Communities Coalition haVGs also filed two new complaints to the UN over civil rights and housing in the hopes of finding a way to hold organizers …
As reported in the British Columbia Globe & Mail: When the world descends on Vancouver in six months for the 2010 Winter Olympics, another kind of convergence will quietly be taking place. A cross-Canada security force will gather to keep those crowds under control, and disaster at bay. “It’s the largest security operation, ever, in …
As reported on NBC Chicago’s web site: Folks from Tulsa to Pittsburgh, Minneapolis to Birmingham, even in Detroit, are lining up for to attract the 2020 Games as if America already lost out on 2016. The murmurs – and news stories – got so loud that the chief of the United States Olympic Committee issued …
As reported from the Chicago Tribune’s online blog “Clout Street” – Mayor Daley’s Chicago 2016 panel has no problem with committee member Michael Scott’s role developing a for-profit real estate project near a planned Olympic venue, according to a statement the organization released Tuesday night. Scott met with Olympic bid officials Tuesday to explain his …
As reported by the Chicago Tribune online: A veteran City of Chicago building inspector was arrested today on a charge of pocketing $1,000 from a contractor who was cooperating with authorities in an ongoing bribery probe. Jose Hernandez approved electrical wiring, plumbing and ventilation work at a single-family residence on South Throop Street even though …
From the Council of the Canadians’ web site: David Eby, the executive director of the BC Civil Liberties Association, recently wrote in the Vancouver Sun that, “While the International Olympic Committee earns a gold medal in the race to protect its sponsors and the Olympic brand, the same cannot be said of its performance in …