● From our sister site, TheSportsExaminer.com ●
A new poll for the Los Angeles Times, coordinated by Suffolk University, published Wednesday, showed that 57% believe the 2028 Olympic Games “will be good” for Los Angeles, while 20% do not and 23% say it won’t matter.
The story on the poll offers only some of the data on the survey, with the Suffolk University Political Research Center site offering much more. This poll, taken by telephone of 500 respondents between 20-23 March 2023, was only for residents of the City of Los Angeles (3.85 million population in 2021), and not the much larger Los Angeles County area, which includes 88 cities (9.83 million) or the L.A, metro area (12.49 million).
The last two questions – out of 39 – were asked about the Olympic Games:
“38. The 2028 Summer Olympic Games will be hosted in Los Angeles. It’s estimated that the games will cost nearly 7 billion dollars in private funds and bring thousands of people to the city for a month of events. Do you think that hosting the Olympics will be good or bad for Los Angeles, or will it not matter?”
● 57.4%: Good
● 20.2%: Bad
● 16.2%: Will not matter
● 6.2%: undecided or won’t answer
So those who don’t know, don’t care or think it won’t matter much are ahead of those against the Games by 22.4% to 20.2%.
“39. How excited are you for the city to host the 2028 Olympics?”
● 56.8%: Very or somewhat excited
● 15.4%: Not very excited
● 25.2%: Not excited
● 2.6%: Undecided or won’t answer
About the same response as question 38.
These figures are down from a February 2022 poll by The Times and SurveyMonkey, but spanning a much larger area – 743 respondents from the Los Angeles, Orange and Ventura counties and the Inland Empire sections of Riverside and San Bernardino counties – that saw 76% in favor of hosting the Games and 16% opposed, and 8% who didn’t care or wouldn’t answer.
Interestingly, the figures for the 2028 Los Angeles Games are much better than Angelenos – City of Los Angeles residents – think about the City itself. Asked to rate Los Angeles “as a place to live”:
● 47.8%: Excellent or Good
● 33.2%: Fair
● 17.6%: Poor
● 1.4%: Undecided
New Mayor Karen Bass, in office barely 100 days, but who has made a push against homelessness a high-profile priority, also failed to excite respondents:
● 50.2% Approve
● 13.8% Disapprove
● 35.2%: Undecided
● 0.8%: Won’t answer
The undercurrent here is that people living in the City of Los Angeles itself aren’t all that happy with it and with what goes on there, now and in the future, including the Olympic Games in 2028. How that changes – for good or bad – in the future will continue to color how the 2028 Games are viewed.
Observed: From the outside, it would seem strange that 22.4% of the respondents said that the 2028 Games won’t matter, were undecided or didn’t answer. This reflects the state of the city today, but also in part a subtle strategy employed by the LA28 organizing committee.
Unlike some other Olympic organizing groups – Atlanta 1996 comes to mind – the LA28 folks have been quiet. They are selling sponsorships, funding millions of dollars worth of City of Los Angeles Recreation and Parks programs for youth and not hiring much.
Yes, there are jobs being filled, but the entire organizing committee so far is only in the 150-plus range, a tiny fraction of the thousands who will be hired by the time we get to 2028. There are no bombastic news conferences, no gaudy advertising campaigns and even a muted selection of 61 items – mostly T-shirts and pins – offered online.
Isn’t this a problem? No. It’s the smart play for now.
First and foremost, the LA28 organizers are keenly aware – minute-by-minute – that the Olympic Games they expected to stage in five years is changing in front of their eyes, daily. What happens to Russia and Belarus going into 2024 and the response from democracies in Europe, Africa, Asia, Oceania and the Americas, will shape the 2028 Games just as the U.S.-led boycott of the Moscow 1980 Games impacted the Los Angeles Games in 1984.
Beyond the impact of the continuing Russian invasion of Ukraine, the questions of what happens to boxing, modern pentathlon and weightlifting, and any sports that the LA28 organizers want to add, are still to be decided, either by the International Olympic Committee alone or in concert with the LA28 organizing committee. That is going to impact the plans for the Olympic Village at UCLA, transportation, hiring, communications, broadcasting and other areas; the decisions are expected by the summer.
Moreover, the LA28 folks know this truth: every dollar they don’t spend on staff, office space and stuff today will be available when the detailed organizing effort is in full speed in 2026, 2027 and 2028.
The Paris 2024 organizers are under severe budgetary pressures brought on by a pandemic they didn’t foresee in 2017 and massive inflation and supply-chain issues that started in 2021. Waiting to see what the 2028 Games has to look like in view of the worldwide, national and local situation closer to 2028 is the right play right now. The time to spend will come and all too soon.
~ Rich Perelman
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