A machine designed to prevent the spread of foot-and-mouth disease in the United States will greet passengers arriving at Salt Lake International Airport this summer. It’s a biological x-ray machine to detect potentially contaminated food. All organic products — fruits, vegetables, meats — show up in colour on a bio x-ray machine. Everything else appears black and white. Contraband food items will be destroyed. Salt Lake City is getting more international travel because of the Olympics and its a way of double-checking what’s coming into the country. Officials are concerned about foreign Olympic committees or teams who plan to bring their own chefs and foods to Utah. The Salt Lake Organizing Committee has sent letters to other nations advising them what will or won’t be acceptable.
A federal judge has shut down a Web site that Olympic officials said was illegally using symbols and phrases. The internet site used pictures of the Olympic mascots and phrases such as “2002 Winter Olympics’ and “Salt Lake City 2002”, for which the Salt Lake Organzing Committee and the U.S. Olympic Committee have established copyrights. The judge agreed that the terminology and symbols suggested a false association with the Olympic movement and advised the webmaster to stop using the trademarked words, symbols and emblems and to turn over to SLOC or the USOC the names of everyone who did business with him or visited the Web site.
Spanish engineer and architect Santiago Calatrava has unveiled a proposal to renovate Athens’ Olympic stadium and the surrounding complex. The centrepiece of the project is a roof for the 80,000-seat stadium – two elegant steel arcs holding strands of translucent glass that let the light in and keep the heat out. A simiar futuristic arc-roof would be placed on top of the nearby cycling stadium, while the entire complex would be joined by walkways lined with trees and pools of water – all intended to keep spectators cool. Temperatures in Athens often reach 104 degrees during the summer. Other features include a large wall with parts that can move to create a wave effect and a tower ouside the stadium to hold the Olympic flame. Calatrava said his plans could be implemented quickly, with many of the structures ordered from abroad and assembled in Athens. No tender is needed for the renovation work and the stadium is due to close early next year for refurbishment.
IOC presidential candidate Kim un-Yong of Korea seems to be looking for support wherever he can find it. He’s now on record as saying that if he’s elected he’ll help build a museum for outgoing president Juan Antonio Samaranch. Kim said he wants to pay tribute to the “brilliant service” of the 80-year-old president who is stepping down on July 16. Kim said, “the Olympic spirit and movement have moved forward by leaps and bounds during his service”.
Meanwhile, the head of the African Olympic committees, Francis Nyangweso, said his group was worried that the next IOC president will pay less attention to Africa, the world’s poorest continent. Nyangweso, president of the Association of National Olympic Committees of Africa, said Juan Antonio Samaranch’s successor must speak for “all the people” and not just represent a particular region. Nyangweso said Samaranch was responsible for enforcing Olympic Solidarity – a committee set up in 1961 to aid Africa and Asian countries and which has helped fund continental associations.
Tom Welch and his attorneys are demanding a retraction and apology from Utah Governor Mike Leavitt for accusing the former bid leader of falsifying Olympic financial statements. Attorney Bill Taylor called Leavitt’s comments slanderous and suggested they are part of a concerted campaign to smear Welch. The governor’s office rebutted whistle-blower Scott Green’s claims that Leavitt and others conspired to blame Welch for bid improprieties and that Green warned his bosses about bid-related scholarship payments a year before they became public. Green, who worked as SLOC’s budget director before going to work for the state, told federal investigators he alerted state budget director Lynne Ward to the scholarship payments more than a year before they became public. He also said Ward told him Leavitt, then state Olympic officer John Fowler, and Olympic leaders, had agreed to blame Welch if questionable payments ever became public.
A federal magistrate upheld racketeering charges against Salt Lake bid head Tom Welch and his deputy, Dave Johnson. It was the second time Magistrate Ronald Boyce ruled against a motion by the lawyers for Welch and Johnson to throw out charges in the Olympic bribery case. Boyce’s latest recommendation went to the trial judge for a final decision. The trial is set to begin July 16.
And finally, U.S. Olympic Committee members toured a PSINet Stadium proposed as a potential Olympic soccer venue, where Olympic soccer matches would be held should Chesapeake Region 2012 Coalition host the 2012 Summer Games. The evaluation team also toured Oriole Park at Camden Yards and the Baltimore Convention Center, which might be used to stage table tennis, and visited the University of Maryland in College Park, the proposed site for the Olympic Village, as well as potential venues for volleyball and team handball. Last month the Chesapeake region’s bid switched its official name to “Washington” instead of “Washington-Baltimore” to meet an IOC requirement that groups have a single-city designation. The 2012 Olympics would bring an estimated $5.3 billion to the Washington-Baltimore-northern Virginia area, $2.5 billion to the state of Maryland and about $1.2 billion to the Baltimore metropolitan area.
