With only one month to go before the International Olympic Committee elects a host city for the 2008 Summer Games, Toronto’s bid committee is increasingly optimistic about it’s chances.
TO-2008 COO Bob Richardson says, “it’s a wide open race. We have received very positive feedback at international meetings over the past months. Everyone knows that Toronto has put forward an excellent plan. But we’ve also put forward an Olympic vision that we feel will resonate with the meembers of the International Olympic Committee”.
And Sandra Levy, Olympian, and member of TEAM 2008, added, “Toronto is the only bid by athletes and for athletes. As the IOC enters a new century, I think you’ll see members, particularly athletes, embrace the kind of Olympic vision Toronto has put forward. It’s a vision that places sport and athletes as the primary focus of the Games. And it’s a bid that has built up a multi-faceted legacy already. This is an important consideration for the International Olympic Committee”.
In the last two months, the bid committee says it has received the following boosts: unprcedented level of government support. In fact Canada’s Prime Minister, Ontario’s Premier and Toronto’s Mayor will all travel to Moscow for the IOC vote in July.
The bid has received sustained public support: Toronto-2008 has signed up more than 80,000 volunteers from the city and the Greater Toronto Area who want to help out with the Games in 2008.
Traffic on the TO-2008 Web site consistently scores hundreds of thousand of hits and has received visits from more than 110 countries says the bid committee. Notably there has been a large increase in European traffic over the last few months.
Richardson said that the bid committee has received a lot of positive feedback from the IOC about the overwhelming support for Toronto from all three levels of government.
And according to reports, a source close to the IOC said that a recent straw vote taken among members reveals Toronto and Paris are closer to Beijing than previously thought. The source indicated that Beijing is favoured by only about 10 more members than the other two.
Richardson said, “it’s sort of like the first day of a federal election campaign. This is the critical month to get the messge out to communicate with people”.
The message TO-2008 is attempting to get across to the 108 or so voting IOC members is that Toronto is a “modern, fun, vibrant and multicultural metropolis” with a plan that is the best for sports and athletes.
While bid officials will be touring during the next month, there is a lot happening right in the city.
There will be a gala concert at Roy Thomson Hall on June 23, which the IOC calls International Olympic Day, co-hosted by four-time world figure skating champion Kurt Browning and Sonia Rodrigues, prima ballerina with the National Ballet of Canada. Included in the gala will be The Toronto Symphony Orchestra, tenor Richard Margison and a 300-person athlete and artist choir.
