Deseret News Archives - June 12, 1995
Salt Lake City is ready now for Friday's vote by members of the International Olympic Committee to choose the site of the 2002 Winter Games.
"The only thing we can do here is lose ground," Salt Lake Olympic Bid Committee Vice President Dave Johnson told Utah reporters at a special press briefing on Monday.
That doesn't mean, of course, that Utah bid officials aren't lobbying the IOC. Johnson, bid president Tom Welch and bid chairman Frank Joklik have spent the past few weeks visiting IOC members around the globe in search of votes.
But unlike the three other bid cities, Salt Lake City is trying to keep a low profile here. There are meetings scheduled with the handful of IOC members who have already arrived, but no elaborate dinners planned.
Salt Lake City is positioned as the front-runner over the other cities bidding for the 2002 Winter Games: Quebec, Canada; Ostersund, Sweden; and Sion, Switzerland.
The IOC Executive Committee began meeting Monday, but most IOC members have yet to arrive in Budapest. The 104th IOC Session, where the host of the 2002 Winter Games will be selected, begins Thursday.
"It's very important for us to look like a winner and, at the same time, not seem overconfident. That's going to be the trick of the week," Johnson said in an interview.
Quebec, considered Salt Lake City's toughest competition is the most visible of the bid cities. With three days to go before the IOC vote, Quebec appears to be making as much effort to attract attention as Salt Lake City is to avoid it.
For example, Salt Lake's bid team wears somber business suits, while officials of Quebec's bid are wandering through Budapest in matching windbreakers covered with the "Quebec 2002" logo.
Salt Lake holds an informal briefing for the Utah press Monday morning; Quebec invites the international media to hear an Indian chief in a falcon-feather headdress declare that Canada's tribes support Quebec.
"Salt Lake is the one everyone has to catch up to," said Quebec 2002 spokesman Paul Burroughs, predicting that French-speaking Canada's charm will win out over Salt Lake's business-like attitude.
"You have to play it by the heart in the last second. I think we have the advantage in that, because we're the link between Europe and North America. We live and breathe in French . . . Salt Lake is not an oasis like that."
Salt Lake isn't reacting to the competition. "I don't think another city can trip Salt Lake City up," Johnson said, adding that the strategy for winning is unchanged.
"There's not going to be any surprises (from us). The message we've had all along has been consistency," he said. "We feel we're building on our strengths, which are our technical qualifications."
The more than 350 Utahns who traveled overseas to support the bid are being kept busy sightseeing in Vienna, Austria. Even after they arrive in Budapest on Tuesday, they'll spend their time far away from the IOC.
Only top bid committee officials, along with Gov. Mike Leavitt and Salt Lake Mayor Deedee Corradini, are supposed to have contact with the IOC members.
The governor said that while as many as 80 of the 96 voting members of the IOC have made up their minds about which bid city to vote for, there's still no way to predict a winner because of the way the election works.
The IOC will cast secret ballots during a two-hour, closed-door session on Friday afternoon until one city gets a majority of votes. The city with the least number of votes in each round is eliminated.
