The New York Post reports that the White House and President George Bush’s allies are working aggressively behind the scenes to win approval for the West Side stadium, considered crucial to New York’s bid for the 2012 Summer Olympic Games.
Roland Betts, a close friend of the President and his point man on the city’s Olympic bid committee, is quoted as saying, “seven years from now Ground Zero will take shape and will look spectacular. To have a moment to celebrate that would be fantastic. The White House is very aware of that”.
According to the Post, the effort to convince key state lawmakers to approve the stadium began last week with phone calls from White House Chief of Staff Andrew Card and from Betts. Betts said, “Mr. Card called Mr. Bruno (State Senate Majority Leader Joseph Bruno, who has a vote on the stadium). And I have called Mr. Bruno. There’s no question we want the Olympics to come to the United States. We believe having the Games in 2012 would coincide with the rebuilding of Ground Zero”.
The Post reports that sources familiar with the effort to build the stadium expect more pressure to come from Washington.
Betts, who met with International Olympic Committee (IOC) members during their evaluation visit to New York in February, said that without a stadium there would be no Olympics. “That’s why there is such a big effort to break the logjam”, he said.
Meanwhile Cablevision, the owner of Madison Square Garden and the chief opponent of the stadium, has launched a new TV ad campaign trying to convince New Yorkers that the proposed West Side stadium is solely a “football stadium, not an Olympic stadium”. Cablevision has spent about $30 million to scuttle the project, reports the New York Daily News, which says the new ad is one of two that the company recently launched.
Anna Levin, a member of a Cablevision-backed group opposing the project says, “the stadium the mayor wants approved isn’t even large enough to host the Olympics. The proposal in Albany right now is for a football stadium, not any Olympic stadium”.
The newspaper reports that Mayor Michael Bloomberg said on his weekly radio show Friday that the stockholders of Cablevision “ought to be up in arms and picketing. They have spent $30 million of their money to stop a project that wouldn’t take business away”.
