San Diego Mayor Bob Filner said Friday he wants San Diego to join forces with Tijuana in a bid for the 2024 Summer Olympic Games.
With Tijuana Mayor Carlos Bustamante at his side as he inaugurated his administration’s new office in Tijuana’s Rio Zone, Filner said, “I’m very serious”.
Although there have been previous proposals for a joint bid Filner said they “didn’t have the heft of the city”, adding that athletic facilities such as the Olympic Training Center in Chula Vista and Tijuana’s state-run High Performance Center would help draw interest to the region.
In February the United States Olympic Committee (USOC) sent letters to 35 U.S. cities explaining the bid process for the 2024 Games. CEO Scott Blackmun told The Associated Press that “we’re in discussion with about 10 cities actively now” and confirmed a bi-national candidacy from San Diego and Tijuana is among them.
When asked specifically about a San Diego and Tijuana joint bid Blackmun said, “that would have its challenges. We haven’t looked at it carefully. We just learned about it”.
In February Mayor Filner first raised the possibility about a joint bid. He spoke about receiving the USOC letter regarding 2020 and said, “when I looked at it, I said, ‘we have to do this together'”.
