Motion seeks end to Calgary’s hosting bid

Calgary’s 2026 Olympic bid has one foot in the grave after a city committee set in motion Tuesday steps that would pull the plug on the bid. Ward 8 Councillor Evan Woolley, chair of council’s Olympic and Paralympic Winter Games assessment committee, recommended suspending work on the bid over a lack of agreement between the three orders of government on how to split $3 billion in public funding needed to host the Games.

But the city’s Olympic plans and accompanying Nov. 13 plebiscite on hosting aren’t over yet.

Council is set to vote on Woolley’s recommendations at a Wednesday meeting, and because the first item requires a reconsideration of the council’s September decision to go to a plebiscite, at least 10 council members must vote in favour.

Conflict over how the city, province and feds would split hosting costs was revealed in the media late last week, with the parties in apparent deadlock after reports that the federal government would contribute up to $1.75 billion to the cost of hosting — in 2026 dollars. With a firm $700-million commitment from the province, that leaves the city with a cost burden officials said was too heavy.

Woolley said that without a finalized cost-sharing agreement that offers an affordable way to close the public funding gap, Calgarians can’t be expected to make an informed decision in a vote less than two weeks away.

“I am not bluffing,” he said. “We were committed to have this cost-share agreement to Calgarians in June. And then it was September. And then it was 35 days before the vote of the electors. And then it was 30 days. And then it was which week and which week.” Knowing the commitments from the province and feds don’t add up to the amount needed to host the Games, Woolley said he had to make a tough call.

“And that point for me, as chair of this committee, is today.”

Woolley said the prospect of cancelling the bid is “deeply disappointing” and council will be faced with difficult conversations on Wednesday.

Woolley presented eight recommendations to the committee, and they voted unanimously to refer them to Wednesday’s strategic meeting of council, where councillors will have a final vote.

A statement from the Calgary Olympic Bid Corp., known as Calgary 2026, says government negotiations are still continuing. “We remain confident an agreement will be reached,” said BidCo chair Scott Hutcheson. “We know thousands of Calgarians understand what’s at stake and the importance of deciding the outcome themselves.”

Mayor Naheed Nenshi said he’s still optimistic that something might change to make a deal possible. He and federal Sport Minister Kirsty Duncan both said the government negotiating teams were in talks until late into Monday night.

On Tuesday, Duncan said she was still “hopeful” about the prospects of Calgary’s Olympic bid, adding that the federal government would “support the federal hosting policy” in offering funds for the Olympics.

Before the city council committee entered closed-session talks that lasted nearly four hours, Nenshi said it had been “challenging” for negotiators to deal with details of talks being revealed in public.