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≡ SPOTLIGHT ≡
“Pursuant to Games Agreement C-139679 between the City and LA28, LA28 is required to obtain the City’s consent prior to implementing actions that move events out of the City and amend the current Venue Plan approved by Council.”
That’s from a Monday report by the City of Los Angeles’ Chief Administrative Officer (CAO) and Chief Legislative Analyst (CLA), the principal staff oversight team on the 2028 Olympic and Paralympic organizing effort.
The 35-page report from the CAO Matthew Szabo and CLA Sharon Tso asks the City Council to begin the process of discussion on the approval of the multiple shifts of sports and venues for the 2028 Olympic and Paralympic Games that were disclosed in June of this year:
Olympic sports and disciplines moved out of Los Angeles:
● Aquatics/Artistic: Dedeaux Field at USC to Long Beach
● Aquatics/Swimming: Dedeaux Field at USC to SoFi Stadium in Inglewood
● Basketball: Crypto.com Arena to Intuit Dome in Inglewood
● Canoe/Slalom: Sepulveda Basin to Oklahoma City
● Equestrian: Sepulveda Basin to Galway Downs in Temecula
● Shooting: Sepulveda Basin to an out-of-L.A. location
Olympic sports and disciplines moving into Los Angeles:
● Archery: SoFi Stadium to Sepulveda Basin
● Cycling/BMX: Long Beach to Sepulveda Basin
● Gymnastics: The Forum to Crypto.com Arena
In addition, LA28 announced that the Sepulveda Basin Recreation Area would host cycling/BMX and skateboarding, as well as archery, and that softball, an added sport, would be held in Oklahoma City.
There are still multiple sports with venues unannounced, including the cycling road races and mountain bike, football preliminaries, modern pentathlon, sport climbing, surfing, beach volleyball and indoor volleyball, plus the added sports of baseball, cricket, flag football, lacrosse and squash.
Boxing is in limbo, but was originally proposed to be held at the Los Angeles Convention Center in the downtown area.
The LA28 analysis of the changes it has announced so far has a financial benefit of $162 million from lowered costs for almost all of the venue changes and better revenue opportunities.
The CAO/CLA report asks the City Council:
● To ask the LA28 organizers for a formal request for the changes it wants to make from the original, 2017 bid plan for the 2028 Olympic and Paralympic Games.
● “Assert City authority to consider and approve all amendments to the Venue Plan,” a position LA28 does not agree with.
● “Council to request for LA28 to conduct an independent economic impact study to highlight the anticipated impacts of the 2028 Games on the City and the region, which incorporates the requested venue changes, added sport disciplines, and lessons learned from the 2024 Paris Games, and to submit the report to the City no later than June 30, 2025.”
The second request is a disagreement between LA28 and the City, over a technical point in the Games Agreement between the parties from 2021. LA28 states in its June 2024 letter to the City that it is only required to seek City approval for venue changes where sports are moved out of the City from the 2017 bid plan. The CAO/CLA report insists that the City must approve any and all venue assignments which differ from the 2017 bid plan, including venue assignments for sports not part of the 2028 program at the time the Games was awarded to Los Angeles.
This will have to be worked out, but the new report outlines what could be a long process of approvals if the CAO/CLA recommendation is adopted by the City Council.
The likely next step for the CAO/CLA report is assignment to the City Council’s Ad Hoc Committee on the 2028 Olympic and Paralympic Games for discussion and a hearing.
The economic impact study will be important for the City to understand what it stands to gain from having the Olympic and Paralympic Games in terms of direct, indirect and induced employment and spending impacts and potential tax revenues that would flow from the holding of the Games in 2028. The report states that LA28 is in the process of having this done and completed in 2025.
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