Just 17 days before Vancouver residents vote in a plebiscite asking them if Vancouver should host the 2010 Winter Olympic Games, opponents of the bid have made their opinions known in various ways.
Victoria resident Dr. Zoltan Roman, a retired professor and a former national-level fencer and basketball player in his native Hungary, sent a two-page letter to International Olympic Committee (IOC) President Jacques Rogge outlining his reasons why the 2010 Winter Olympics should not come to B.C.
He said that B.C. and Canada can’t afford the Games. He plans to send an avalanche of paper from Victoria to Lausanne and will follow his letter to Rogge with several more to IOC officials prior to the IOC’s selection of the 2010 host city on July 2 in Prague.
Paul Rideout, spokesman for CUPE’s Mid-Island Coalition for Strong Communities, addressed Nanaimo B.C city council requesting the council not to support the 2010 Winter Games unless it first holds a plebiscite on the bid. He said, “it is difficult to accept that a government which tells us we cannot afford to fund services or programs that benefit those most in need in our communities can afford to fund the Olympic gamble”.
Nanaimo city council disregarded Rideout’s comments and will not hold a plebiscite.
The B.C. Green Party is also against the bid. It’s asking Vancouverites to do “what’s right for all British Columbians and vote No in the plebiscite”.
Adrian Carr, leader of the B.C. Green Party said, “taxpayers will end up with speedskating ovals and luge runs instead of schools and hospitals; and communities all over B.C. will end up in continued economic doldrums as money get focused even more on the well-off Whistler-Vancouver corridor”.
