The Olympics will be coming back to Los Angeles.
City officials recently made a deal with the International Olympic Committee — let Paris have 2024; we’ll take 2028.
Of course, we now face a marathon-length of time to wait before the games begin. Eleven years is a long time to remain enthusiastic about anything, even the Olympic Games.
But before we start this race, L.A. must also clear the local anti-Olympics hurdle.
The Olympics will be coming back to Los Angeles.
City officials recently made a deal with the International Olympic Committee — let Paris have 2024; we’ll take 2028.
Of course, we now face a marathon-length of time to wait before the games begin. Eleven years is a long time to remain enthusiastic about anything, even the Olympic Games.
But before we start this race, L.A. must also clear the local anti-Olympics hurdle.
The anti-Olympic argument goes a little something like this: we don’t need or want the Olympics because of traffic, or a lack of money, or because “there are more important issues to deal with.”
The “there are more important issues” argument comes up a lot in many different political situations, and it never makes much sense to me. If the city council wants to honor Japanese Americans by voting to declare Japanese American Day, that decision does not prevent the city from addressing other issues such as crime or homelessness. People are capable of dealing with more than one issue at a time.
Taken by itself, “more important issues” is just a way of saying “I don’t like this idea” without having to explain why.
Of course, the “more important” argument usually leads to the “money/ budget” argument. Nobody likes money to be wasted, and cities have limited budgets.
But cities support many things which some may consider not strictly necessary — art, for example. Or parks. Few would argue that parks and art are as important as schools or crime. But we pay for parks, zoos, public art, history museums and music auditoriums because they provide all of us with intangible benefits. Parks won’t solve crime, but they help make life better in ways which can’t be easily quantified.
The Olympics will pay off in civic pride, historic moments, memories and more.
The “money” argument is odd because there is plenty of private funding and corporate sponsorship to support the Olympics. Corporate sponsorship helped Los Angeles make a profit off of the 1984 Olympics — and helped to save the Olympics in the process.
Public stadium construction has also been an issue for some Olympic host cities. But that problem wouldn’t apply to Los Angeles, which could host the Olympics now if needed. We have the stadiums, and they won’t go to waste after the games close.
Finally, there is traffic. Los Angeles in 1984 didn’t have the Red Line subway or Metrolink commuter trains or the Expo Line to Santa Monica — but we still handled the traffic. By the time 2028 arrives, we will have miles of transit.
No city is better prepared to host the Olympics than Los Angeles. Even if we have to wait, we should be able to put on a gold medal-winning Olympic performance.
James Fujitais an editor at the Go For Broke National Education Center in Little Tokyo. He is a former GVN news editor, and copy editor for Visalia Times-Delta. Fujita can be contacted at jim61773@yahoo.com
