The 2010 Olympic Winter Spend

The 2010 Winter Olympics are being held in and around the Greater
Vancouver area. I am a long time resident of Vancouver, and I have
been against them from day one. It just didn’t feel right. I knew that
the cost would be huge. But the powers that be had their way and the
spending began. And boy have they been spending. This one time event
is already costing billions and it hasn’t even happened yet. And the
Olympic track record for profitability is poor at best. Montreal just
finally paid off the debt created by their games from 30 years ago.
There is no justifiable reason for spending that kind of money on a
few weeks of sport. Not when there are thousands of people in
Vancouver alone that live hand to mouth or worse. Our city is somewhat
famous for our homelessness problem. Less than half the amount of
money spent on the games would have solved that problem permanently.
Not just some “sweep it under the rug” solution for the duration of
the world’s attention. City hall passed a bylaw that all homeless
people must stay in a shelter each night. If they are found on the
street after curfew, the police are allowed to arrest them and throw
them in lock up for the night. That is their solution.
We could have used a some of the money spent on the games to improve
our transit system too. Oh they did build the Canada Line Skytrain (an
underground “sky”train) to link downtown to Richmond and the airport.
Which will come in very handy for all the tourists that want to travel
from the airport to their expensive hotels by foot. But will it be
useful for commuters afterwards? Well maybe they should have asked the
few thousand people who used the former bus line each day. I’m sure
they would agree that blowing billions of tax dollars to shave ten or
twenty minutes off their commute is worth paying for, for the next 50
years. There has never been and never will be the number of transit
riders coming and going from Vancouver to Richmond to warrant the need
for such an expensive mode of mass transit. They could have put dozens
of new busses on the old route for less than the cost of the new
trains, let alone the underground tracks and a new bridge. We need
more busses and a 24 hour transit system. Not a hole to Richmond.
Some people feel that the infrastructure being build due to the games
will benefit our region for years to come. Sure, it will give use top
quality training facilities for future athletes. And the Sea to Sky
highway is now wider, making it easier and a bit safer to travel to
Squamish and Whistler. As long as there are no more rock slides. But
when there are more important social problems that need to be
addressed, it’s hard to see how new arenas and a wider road to a
resort town are wise spending. And since so much has been spent, the
city is scrambling to find where they can cut costs elsewhere. City
council is currently working on closing down the Bloedel conservatory
at Queen Elizabeth park, as well as the children’s petting zoo at
Stanley Park. Seriously? How expensive could those thing really be?
They are a drop in the bucket of where money is spent in this city.
And the cost cutting is happening on a provincial level as well. The
government has cut funding to arts programs. Which seems funny
considering that thousands of tourists are coming to our city during
the games. Tourists that might want to see something besides game
events. Especially in the evenings when there are no games. Is every
one going to bed at 8:00? And ask any resident of northern BC if they
feel they will get their tax dollar’s worth while they watch Men’s
Hockey on CBC.
I could go on and on, but I will finish by saying I have never wanted
the 2010 winter Olympic games to come to my city. And I will not
directly support the games. I figure they will be getting my money for
the rest of my life, why should I have to pay for a ticket.

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