Completed host questionnaire brings Utah closer to hosting another Olympics
May 26, 2023, 8:30 PM | Updated: May 30, 2023, 7:05 am
Signage at the Utah Olympic Park, which was built for the Salt Lake 2002 Olympic Winter Game. Before Salt Lake City could secure the 2034 Olympic games, they had to make a last-minute agreement with WADA. (Kristin Murphy/Deseret News)
(Kristin Murphy/Deseret News)
SALT LAKE CITY — Utah’s team bidding on the Olympic Games is already finishing work on the future host questionnaire. This questionnaire is a requirement from the International Olympic Committee. So, what kind of questions does it ask?
To help answer this question, Frasier Bullock, president and CEO of the Salt Lake City Utah committee for the Games joins Jeff Caplans Afternoon News. He says the questionnaire asks a “whole spectrum” of questions.
“It’s actually 35 pages of questions in that questionnaire,” Bullock tells host Jeff Caplan. “And it’s all the way from things like our vision, our purpose, what we’re trying to accomplish to things like sustainability, because we have to have climate positive games, to how we’re going to manage the operations of the games.”
On top of this, Bullock says there are 35 annexes, which include things like detailed plans of the Olympic Theater and transportation routes.
“And then we have guarantees we have to provide from the federal government, state and local government,” he says. “It’s a massive undertaking.”
Citing the committee’s work, Caplan asks “You’ve made any number of presentations, don’t they have this information already?”
“Well, no,” Bullock says. “We’ve done high-level presentations of our vision and things like that. This is now all the detail to actually host the games.”
He goes on to say the committee is 95% finished with completing the questionnaire. Bringing it closer to the end, Bullock says the governing board approved recently approved a bid file. This bid file will go to the US Olympic and Paralympic Committee.
Confidence in bringing the Olympic Games back to Utah
According to Bullock, the host questionnaire requires the committee to give a detailed roadmap of what the games would look like if they came back to Utah.
“It is like transportation times from the Olympic Village to all the Olympic venues,” he says. “It is an entire schedule for the games – what we envision happening day by day, each venue [and] what competitions are going to be held- an entire competition schedule. It’s really fun putting it together, but it’s a tremendous amount of work.”
Bullock is “extremely” confident that Utah will host the 2030 or 2034 games.
“The entire Olympic movement (understands) how strong a bid we have,” he says. “I think will be rewarded with the opportunity to host the games.”
Listen to the full segment below.
Listen to Jeff Caplan’s Afternoon News on weekdays from 3 to 7 p.m.
