Economist, Olympic Expert Andrew Zimbalist on Boston 2024's '2.0' Plan: 'It's Bologna'

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http://bostinno.streetwise.co/2015/07/02/economist-olympic-expert-andrew-zimbalist-on-boston-2024s-2-0-plan-its-bologna/

"The attractive things that are there, we can do without having to take the detour of having the Olympic Games."

Economist, Olympic Expert Andrew Zimbalist on Boston 2024's '2.0' Plan: 'It's Bologna'
Hayden Bird
07/02/15

The release of Boston 2024's "2.0" plan, while far from the final version of the bid (as noted by its chairman and CEO), represents the latest attempt of the local Olympic organizers to win over a skeptical public. The key factor in garnering a majority approval rating, a prerequisite to the bid's success, will be best achieved by showing Boston not only that it stands to gain from the Olympics coming to town, but that it will be protected from the risks.

In other words, Boston 2024 needs the numbers to back up what it claims. In analyzing the 2.0 plan, few minds are better attuned to study Olympic bids than economist and Smith College professor Andrew Zimbalist. His recent book, Circus Maximus, details the many risks that accompany a city choosing to host either the Olympics or the World Cup. Already an active voice in the Boston 2024 conversation, he recently spoke with BostInno about his views on Boston 2024's 2.0 plan.

On Boston 2024's insurance plan:

It's bologna. They said nothing concretely about cost overrun insurance. Nothing concretely, accept the notion that they put out there that they're going to require the private developers to buy their own insurance to cover cost overruns. They acknowledge at one point in their documents that there might be an unattractive rate of return to prospective developers. And they say how they're going to deal with that: They're going to rebalance the distribution between public and private money. They're asking private developers to do an awful lot for very little potential return.

What he sees as the reality of what Boston 2024 will have to do to tempt developers:

It's going to be enormously difficult to find developers who want to take it on their (Boston 2024's) terms. I think what Boston 2024 is going to have to do if they want to get private developers is to sweeten the pot. And the way you sweeten the pot is by adding public money and adding very very deep tax incentives. All of that is going to be very costly to the public sector.