On a sweltering Monday morning, Boston City Councilor Tito Jackson took to the podium on the steps of City Hall to unleash the latest attack against Boston 2024’s transparency. Following round after round of Freedom of Information Act requests that have slowly unfurled the initially redacted parts of the “1.0” bid, Jackson confirmed in an impassioned address what many suspected.
He filed an order for subpoena to get Boston 2024 to release the final unredacted sections of the 1.0 bid book (chapters five and six). Jackson gave Boston 2024 a deadline of last Friday (July 17) to turn over the unseen chapters, but bid CEO Rich Davey sent only a letter explaining why organizers could not provide the material.
“I am here to address an important, urgent and timely issue: The transparency of Boston 2024, their Olympic committee and the bid,” said Jackson in his opening.
He sharply rebuked Boston 2024 for flatly refusing to allow an elected official to view the full bid:
As a Boston City Councilor, I have a mandate, responsibility and I have a right to see any document that makes a financial commitment on behalf of the City of Boston. Promises were made to the United States Olympic Committee on behalf of the City of Boston without the full vetting, inclusion and the voice of the people of the City of Boston. And we deserve and demand full knowledge of what those promises. In particular, the promises that are in the winning bid, bid 1.0, specifically those that are financial and relate to city planning.
Of course, even amid yet another legitimate call for increased transparency from Boston 2024, it’s worth noting a simple reality:
Boston 2024 is the most transparent Olympic bid in recent history.
Since it’s easy to doubt that assertion, let’s at least take a look at the other 2024 Olympic bids and what plans they’ve released in comparison to Boston 2024’s details.
Budapest’s 2024 bid has only announced its candidacy with an official letter of intent. It has, to this point, not even released the 1,300-page feasibility study that was produced prior to launching the bid. No plan has been made public.
Hamburg’s 2024 bid has a referendum coming up in November (which was only made possible by a constitutional amendment), yet they also have released only a few details. No major financial estimates have been made public, other than the projected cost of the entire Games.
Paris’ 2024 bid, only in its initial stages, is officially launched but without a plan. Paris Mayor Anne Hidalgo is pitching the bid on venue sites, but nothing definitive has been announced.
Rome’s 2024 bid, despite being the first to announce its candidacy, is similar to its European counterparts. Though certain venues have been vaguely mentioned in reference to a plan, nothing concrete has been released to the public. No thoroughly researched financial records are out for review, despite the fact that taxpayer money will be the largest source of payment for Rome’s vision of the 2024 Games.
And even looking farther back at Chicago’s failed bid for the 2016 Summer Olympics, Boston is still more advanced and more transparent than its U.S. predecessor. Chicago won USOC endorsement in April of 2007. At that point, some details were known (similar to Boston’s 1.0 bid). Yet the plan was not released until the following January. Even then, the level of detail was nothing compared with what Boston 2024 has published.
Conclusion
It’s a truly bizarre reality when, in the same breath, non-bias observers are able to call Boston 2024 the most transparent Olympic bid in recent history, yet simultaneously maintain that the bid is facing the rightful prospect of subpoena and further FOIA requests.
How is such a double reality possible?
Answer: Olympic bids have historically been extremely guarded in disclosing details. And the host cities have, through the years, been alarmingly okay with that. That reality seems to have continued in the 2024 bidding process, only Boston is different.
Boston residents and elected officials who have taken such an active role in calling for transparency from Boston 2024 would clearly be appalled at the lack of demand in other cities for specific details earlier in the bidding process. Hamburg in particular stands out in this regard, given that they have a public referendum on the issue rapidly approaching on November 24th, yet the electorate has no access to the full plan (or anything even close it it).
In the course of the discussion on Boston 2024’s bid, a familiar refrain from Olympic boosters has been that “we do it differently here,” in reference to their belief that American Olympics’ make money (which itself, is not entirely true).
Yet that quote is ironically applicable in the case of bid transparency.
Boston is, in fact, doing it differently than the rest of the world in its Olympic bid. Instead of waiting on the exact details for a plan that will cost billions, residents and their government are demanding a higher standard. And the bid, to its credit, has attempted to answer the call (doing so to a historic degree). Ultimately, however, being the most transparent bid in the world right now doesn’t appear to be enough for Boston 2024.
Image via BostInno
