{"id":185702,"date":"2018-10-16T02:41:57","date_gmt":"2018-10-16T06:41:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/?p=185702"},"modified":"2018-10-16T02:41:57","modified_gmt":"2018-10-16T06:41:57","slug":"calgary-mayor-doesnt-want-spend-province-2026-games","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/2018\/10\/16\/calgary-mayor-doesnt-want-spend-province-2026-games\/","title":{"rendered":"Calgary mayor doesn’t want to spend more than province on 2026 Games"},"content":{"rendered":"
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\u201cI think if you’re looking at the city putting in $800 million, more than the province, that is not a good deal,\u201d Nenshi said Monday. (File Photo<\/a>: Naheed Nenshi\/Facebook<\/a>)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

CALGARY \u2013 The mayor of Calgary says the city shouldn’t contribute more than the province of Alberta to host the 2026 Winter Games.<\/p>\n

Alberta has committed $700 million if Calgary bids for and wins the right to host the 2026 Olympic and Paralympic Games.<\/p>\n

The federal government won’t provide more than $1.5 billion under a policy for hosting international sport events, and has yet to state how much money it would put in.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think if you’re looking at the city putting in $800 million, more than the province, that is not a good deal,\u201d Nenshi said Monday.<\/p>\n

By that rationale, the numbers don’t quite add up to the city and provincial and federal governments producing $3 billion in public investment the bid corporation Calgary 2026 asked for in the $5.2 billion total price tag.<\/p>\n

There is a large moving part in Calgary’s sports landscape, however, that could inject wiggle room into the proposed 2026 budget.<\/p>\n

Nenshi has questioned whether there is a need for a $100-million mid-size arena in Calgary 2026’s draft host plan if terms for a new NHL arena \u2013 which isn’t part of the host plan \u2013 are agreed upon.<\/p>\n

Both Nenshi and Calgary 2026 board chair Scott Hutcheson say work is ongoing on finding cost savings.<\/p>\n

\u201cEvery good idea from here to 2026 would be explored,\u201d Hutcheson said.<\/p>\n

\u201cAs with every other Olympics between the time of a bid and the time of putting on a games, you want to make sure you’ve looked at every idea, challenged it, challenged the costs and try to do a better job over seven years, between a bid awarded and a bid execution.\u201d<\/p>\n

Calgary city council could pull the plug on a bid at any time, but is unlikely to do so before a Nov. 13 plebiscite asking Calgarians if they want to host the Winter Games or not.<\/p>\n

The International Olympic Committee will accept 2026 bids Jan. 11. The election of the host city is in June.<\/p>\n

When arena talks broke down between the city and the NHL’s Calgary Flames last year, Nenshi went public with the city’s proposal, which included a taxpayer contribution of $185 million to a $555-million arena.<\/p>\n

City council voted last week to try to re-engage the Flames on arena talks.<\/p>\n

How much money the federal government would contribute to Calgary hosting the games is expected to be announced within the week, Nenshi told council Monday.<\/p>\n

\u201cI made it clear to the federal government we have a plebiscite on Nov. 13th and people need the time to look at the numbers before they make their vote, as do I by the way,\u201d the mayor said.<\/p>\n

In a letter to Nenshi and federal Sport Minister Kirsty Duncan, Alberta Finance Minister Joe Ceci said $700 million is the absolute limit and \u201cwe will not be providing any form of guarantee for additional costs arising from any source.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThe province’s number was well within the range that we had discussed,\u201d the mayor said.<\/p>\n

The federal government’s policy for hosting international sports events allows for funding up to 50 per cent of public sector investment \u2013 $1.5 billion in this case \u2013 and states \u201cat no time will the Government of\u00a0Canada\u00a0undertake to guarantee deficit funding of a bidding or hosting project.\u201d<\/p>\n

Nenshi doesn’t want the city in a position of games guarantor, but points to the $1.1 billion in contingency funds in Calgary 2026’s draft plan as insurance against deficits.<\/p>\n

Venues from the 1988 Winter Olympics in Calgary such as the Olympic Oval,\u00a0Canada\u00a0Olympic Park at WinSport and the nordic centre in Canmore, Alta., are the foundation of Calgary’s potential bid.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe real danger of cost over-runs comes in construction,\u201d the mayor said. \u201cWe’re not building much.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou won’t see giant cost over-runs like you’ve seen in other Olympics where they’re basically building everything from scratch.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

CALGARY \u2013 The mayor of Calgary says the city shouldn’t contribute more than the province of Alberta to host the …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":44,"featured_media":185703,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[18,16],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-185702","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-news-ca","category-news","mauthors-donna-spencer","mauthors-the-canadian-press"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/185702","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/44"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=185702"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/185702\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/185703"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=185702"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=185702"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=185702"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}