Six reasons to worry about the 2028 Olympics – Los Angeles Times

Mayor Eric Garcetti and the L.A. 2028 Olympic bid committee are in a tremendous hurry to pass the new Host City Contract that they negotiated privately with the International Olympic Committee last month through the City Council. They’ve hosted zero public community gatherings to specifically discuss the 2028 bid — unless you count one-minute comments at Friday’s ad hoc council meeting — but they want you to think that previous deliberations about the 2024 bid should suffice. They don’t.

Make no mistake: L.A. lost the 2024 bid to Paris and took the 2028 option, rebranding and pivoting to 2028 as a win instead of a last resort. The L.A. bid committee finished second in a race of two. This is not a triumph for anyone. The IOC is attempting to award two Summer Olympics simultaneously out of fear that the Olympic brand is broken and that there won’t be multiple (or any) cities vying for 2028, which would be embarrassing.

Unfortunately for the residents of Los Angeles, City Council members and Garcetti don’t think it’s necessary to vet the 2028 Host City Contract properly via independent entities, including conducting financial studies as they did with the 2024 bid proposal. These outside bodies would and should calculate the risk of committing to an Olympics 11 years away from all possible angles.

There are many crucial questions that remain unanswered. Here are the most pressing: