News   Apr 03, 2020
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Calgary's Potential 2026 Winter Olympic Bid

Are you in favour of Calgary's Potential Olympic Bid in 2026?

  • Yes

    Votes: 31 60.8%
  • No

    Votes: 13 25.5%
  • Unsure

    Votes: 7 13.7%

  • Total voters
    51
What number does the budget contribute to a new NHL calibre arena?
Well, it would be whatever the amount is for the smaller arena. Minimum would be around $100 million. Max would be depending on how other projects go, and how much contingency you want to leave in in each individual budget. I think it could go as high as $180 million, informed only by my somewhat familiarity with the budgets of the pieces over the months.
 
Voted yes and encouraged a few others to vote yes as well. Great leveraging opportunity. I don't know how any city builder would vote against it now that a lot of the wrinkles have been ironed out recently. Not expecting much though, as I'm sure the nimby/fiscally conservative crowds are out in full force.
 
I voted yes also. I was leaning toward the no side for a while but changed my mind at the last minute. Sometimes as a city you just have to go for something. I know the Olympics are a big deal and big cost, and a plebiscite is warranted, but I'm glad the city doesn't do this every time they want to do something that might make the city better. If we had a plebiscite for the Peace Bridge or the library, they wouldn't exist today.
 
I think it is a lost opportunity. People are so focused on the $ amount and right now. If this were to go forward it would have been spread out over 6-7 years and be a great event for the city. Most of the comments I see online are along the lines of “not from my pocket”. Big ole “can’t do” attitude infecting the city now.
 
I didn't vote, only because I couldn't decide. There were reasons on both sides of the argument, so in the end I decided to let nature take its course. I'm okay with the no vote and hope the city can use the money that would have gone to the Olympics toward a new field house and arena, or new stadium and arena. If the vote had have been yes, I would have fully thrown my support behind it.
 
All I gotta say is yes it was a shady bid. But I think majority of Calgarians voted "NO" due to the fear-mongering of the final costs and not being able to pay anymore taxes with the state of the economy. I think if we had 2 more weeks of everyone learning the real benefits and how actually good this bid was we may have had a "YES" majority. Most people I talked to this week still didn't know anything about the cost layout, they just thought it was a waste of money. The real waste of money is going to happen now when we end up paying for everything on our own from a new field house to upgrading McMahon stadium. I was initially supportive of the bid, then against it, but then I spent a solid 2 hours just looking at all the pros and cons and it became very apparent that this was for the most part a great deal. Calgarians are generally very tax averse. @Cowtown is right that if we were to have a plebiscite for every major project nothing would ever get built in this city. On top of that, from my experience, I do think most of the people that supported the idea of the olympics really didn't care to go vote, they just sort of said if it happens it happens. Overall, Im not heartbroken over the rejection of the bid, Im more heartbroken with the grumpy attitude of the citizens of Calgary. It takes only two mins to open and read any Calgary Herald or Global News article filled with nasty comments on anything progressive happening in this city. I hope we can just find that optimistic spirit we once had towards these things.
 
I think there were good reasons on both sides. Sadly some of the people I spoke with who were voting 'no' had no idea of the cost breakdown. There were were knowledgeable people who had their reasons to vote no, but others who had no clue. I spoke with a friend after she had already voted no and her reasoning was 'we can't afford $5 Billion dollars, it works out to $5,000 per person'.
 
I also heard there may have been an 'anti-Nenshi' element to the vote. This makes no sense to me. Whether you are going to vote 'yes or no, as least base your decision on what you think is right for the city and/or your own situation. Don't make the decision about personality. Nenshi may not even be mayor in three years never mind in eight.
 
Kind of sad to see the no vote win and see many people so anti-Olympic. Many of the NO voters were downright mean spirited. That said, the bid did have a problems from the get go. Maybe Calgary should take another stab at this for the 2034 Olympics and get a better more thought out plan. I think there are a lot of benefits to hosting the Olympics, and I’d love to see one here in my hometown sometime.
 
I think it is a lost opportunity. People are so focused on the $ amount and right now. If this were to go forward it would have been spread out over 6-7 years and be a great event for the city. Most of the comments I see online are along the lines of “not from my pocket”. Big ole “can’t do” attitude infecting the city now.
The CAVE mentality. (Citizens Against Virtually Everything). I know some of the NO voters had good reasons, but a good number of them weren't going to vote for it no matter what.
 
Yes vote by ward:
olympics pleb.PNG


I wish I could find a map or better yet shapefile of the polling stations / districts they used -- the results are available by that geography, but it's different from the 2017 election stations.

There are a number of interesting splits that are visible -- the Renfrew/Bridgeland/Inglewood portions of Ward 9 voted 51.9% for, and the remainder voted only 32.3% for. The northern tip of Ward 11 (Windsor Park north) voted 60.1% for, the southern part voted 40.3% for. While Ward 10 was very strong No in general, Coral Springs (Nenshis' home turf) voted 49.8% for. The highest No vote was Ian Bazalgette in Dover (only 25.7% yes); the highest Yes vote was William Reid school in Elbow Park (67.2%)

47 of the 160 polling stations had a Yes majority on the day of voting; note that day-of voting was generally more positive with 46.1% voting yes (overall 43.6% voted yes). The advance, main-in and institutional polling was strongly no; only 31.9% voting yes.

Final note - the Oct 31 reconsideration motion; the wards with the 8 councillors who voted to reconsider and kill the bid voted 45.3% in favour of hosting; the other 6 wards voted only 41.3% in favour.
 
Apparently the province is open to the possibility of another Olympic bid? Wasn't it the province who lead the charge to kill the previous one? link

The legacy of 88 definitely needs some work, could definitely use a funding boost! That being said, I would prefer to try and land X games than the Olympics again.
 

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