The staff editorial is the majority opinion of The Murray State News Editorial Board.
The Olympic Games have long represented unity, (mostly) friendly competition and, perhaps most importantly, money. To host either the summer or winter games is an honor, yes, but also a huge commitment. There are few cities that have pockets deep enough to fund such a venture.
As the costs associated with hosting the games have climbed into the tens of billions, some have begun to question how much they’re willing to pay for bragging rights and a potential tourism boost. Cities that have dropped bids for upcoming games such as Boston and Stockholm have their answer: not quite enough.
Initial estimates for the cost of the 2018 Winter Olympics in Pyeongchang, South Korea were set at a meager $7 billion, though the final tally is closer to $13 billion, according to a report from CNBC. This pales in comparison to the $51 billion bill Sochi, Krasnodar Krai, Russia incurred from hosting the winter games in 2014. And these are not outliers: Tokyo is set to host the 2020 Summer Olympics with an estimated $12.6 billion budget, though this figure, reported by CNBC, is likely to increase.
The price tag associated with hosting the games often increases due to necessary infrastructure improvements needed to accommodate a massive influx of visitors. Said improvements are often outlined by the International Olympics Committee. The Council on Foreign Relations reported “the IOC requires cities hosting the summer games to have a minimum of forty thousand available hotel rooms.” And that’s just one of such undertakings hosting cities must take on to meet their Olympic-size promises.
Bidding for Olympic fame has become bogged down by political espionage and under-the-table deals. IOC President Thomas Bach has vowed to reform the bidding process, though the IOC has regularly dealt with its own fair-share of negative press. It’s important the issue has been acknowledged, however, and Bach appears sincere in his mission.
But what if the bidding process was sidelined permanently? It has been suggested the IOC designate certain cities that will rotate hosting the Olympics. This would eliminate back-alley bribery and the costs associated with bidding (these can amount to hundreds of millions of dollars).
Sure, some nations will have their feelings hurt if they’re not chosen to be part of the host rotation, but so what? The financial burdens of construction and security often fall on the backs of taxpayers. Montreal only just finished paying off the debt it accrued from hosting the 1976 Summer Games in 2006 (that’s three decades of taxpayer strain for those counting). Most of these costs were associated with building Quebec’s Olympic Stadium which has become not-so-fondly known as the Big Owe. Why should the layperson be penalized for the actions of a government vying for fame and fortune?
The Rio de Janeiro games became infamous for the Brazilian government’s razing of slums, towns and villages located on or near venue sites. Entire communities were displaced to accommodate for new infrastructure and environmental cleanup efforts, neither of which were considered successful.
The IOC awarded Rio de Janeiro status as a host city despite the nearly insurmountable hurdles the city would have to clear before the Olympics began. It was a poor decision, one which innocent people paid for with their homes and meager livelihoods.
Building ski courses and other winter venues requires quite a bit of space. Pyeongchang destroyed “tens of thousands of trees from the slopes of Mount Gariwang, including ancient and rare species” to make room for ski slopes, according to a report by The Guardian. The forest is considered a sacred site by many across Asia, and, despite plans to replace over a thousand trees, the damage has been done. It’s an environmental travesty on many levels.
This destruction need not occur in the future, though.
If the ballooning financial and environmental costs of constructing Olympic venues and villages continue to rise, the IOC will need to start playing hardball. Instituting a defined roster of Olympic hosts will cut down on unnecessary construction and waste. At the very least, sustainability and humanitarian causes must be pushed to the forefront of the committee’s decision making process.
No tradition is worth displacing innocent people or further tainting our environment. If the Olympic Games are to continue to represent unity and good faith, they must evolve to survive.