Here is the outline for the book Tom Tresser is writing: No Games Chicago: How We A Small Group of Citizens Derailed the City’s 2016 Olympic Bid. Get all the details here.
At around 11am local time on October 2, 2009, at the Bella Center in Copenhagen, Denmark, the International Olympic Committee met to decide the future of Chicago.
They were meeting to decide which of four Finalist Cities would host the 2016 Summer Olympics.
The four cities were Chicago, Rio de Janeiro, Madrid, and Tokyo.
Through a series of votes, the first city to receive a majority of those present and voting would be awarded the right to host the Games. There were 94 members present that morning.
Chicago received 18 votes on the first round and was eliminated from the process.
The Chicago 2016 Committee raised $92 million to prosecute and promote the bid and was backed by three of the most powerful men in America: Chicago Mayor Richard M. Daley, Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich, and President of the United States Barack Obama.
The common wisdom (and odds in Las Vagas) had Chicago as the favorite to win the 2016 Summer Games.
The elimination of Chicago on the first vote was a shock, to say the least.
What happened?
The pursuit of an Olympic Games is a costly, corrupt, and wasteful affair. The bidding process runs at the highest levels of government and is run by the most powerful people in public life. It is standard operating procedure for a city’s bid to be backed by its business elites – enormously wealthy (mostly White) men – and backstopped by the local media and nonprofit eco-system.
This is the story of a small group of people with no office, budget, staff, or active collaborators who worked together to defeat those forces and, in so doing, saved Chicago from a disaster on the order of the Great Fire of 1871.
Introduction
The Set-Up
- Telling This Story
- The Olympics Are BIG Business
- Chicago Makes It’s Play
- Prelude to the Battle for the Bid – The Latin School Lincoln Park Land Grab
- The Players – The International Olympic Committee
- The Players – For the City
- The Players – The Opposition
- (Public) Skin in the Game
The Battle for the Bid
- My Situation
- We Go Public on January 31, 2009
- What Did the Bid Actually Propose?
- The Research – What We Learned
- Strategy & Tactics
- Key Insight Early On
- Messaging and Messengers – An Insider Comes Forward
- Detailed Advice from the Insider
- The Importance of Design
- Messaging and Humor
- Resources
- Going Public – April Rally & March
- We Go Public, Part 2 – Operation Cheese
- Showing Up at the IOC Press Conference
- A Strange Encounter!
- Going Public at the Olympic Museum
- Taking No Games to the Palace Hotel
- Our Party is Crashed
- We Grow on the Media
- Star Power and the Bid
- Arrogance, Thuggery, Missteps
- Democracy Takes a Holiday in Lincoln Park
- Mayor Daley Must Sign the Blank Check – Aldermen Briefed in Secret – We Spill the Beans
- 50 Wards in 50 Days – And We Were There!
- Two Examples of How We Delivered Community Forums
- A Whole Lotta Fuss About a Community Benefits Agreement
- The Wimps of the Bid
- The Collaborators of the Bid
- 2016 Economic Impact Study a Work of Fiction
- Who Paid for the Bid?
- It Wouldn’t Be a Chicago Thing Without a Few Scandals
- They Tried to Bribe Me
- Bid Byproduct – Hospital Razed
- The Battle of the Bid’s Last Days – A Flurry of City Activity – Whining & Whitewashing
- Heading to Decision Day – We Email the IOC 70 Days in a Row!
- The Tide Is Turned – Chicagoans Say “No Games!”
- We Go Public, Part 3 – A Protest at City Hall
- We Go Public, Part 4 – Operation Mermaid – What Happened in Copenhagen –
The End of the Battle
The Aftermath – Lessons Learned and Unlearned
- Immediately After the Decision
- What Should No Games Do Next?
- Did No Games Make a Difference?
- Delusional Post-Mortems & No Mention of No Games
- One Year Later – No One Cares
- No Games Chicago Is Erased from the Record
- We Finally Get Some Love (and Ink)
- We Were Spied On!
- Brazilian Gold – Bid President Arrested – No Games Erased Again
- The Pricey Legacy of the Bid
- Post Battle Research – The Olympics Are Always Budget Busters
- The No Games Ripple Effect
Public Policies and Public Imperatives
- Lessons for the Future
- Closing Thoughts
- Online Extras
- Literature in the Field
- About the Author
- No Games Chicago “Battle for the Bid” Timeline
Endnotes
during our fight?
