 Commonwealth Motors Sponsors the Boston Olympic DebateThis Press Article concerns the Commonwealth of Massachusetts.
olympic-debate Here are a few things to know about the debate and its significance: When is the debate? Thursday (July 23) from 8-9 p.m. EST. Who will be debating? Boston 2024 Chair Steve Pagliuca and U.S. Olympic Committee board member Daniel Doctoroff will represent the pro-Olympics side. On the other side will be Chris Dempsey, the co-chair of No Boston Olympics, and economist Andrew Zimbalist, the author of “Circus Maximus: The Economic Gamble Behind Hosting the Olympics and the World Cup.” Boston’s 2024 Olympic Bid Where can I watch/listen to the debate? The debate, from FOX 25 and The Boston Globe, will air on TV on Fox 25. You can also watch it at bostonglobe.com and myfoxboston.com, as well as the Fox 25 news app. WBUR will also air the debate live, so you can listen on WBUR-FM from 8-9 p.m. The Globe’s Sacha Pfeiffer and Fox 25’s Maria Stephanos will moderate the debate, which will be held at the Fox 25 studio in Dedham. There will be no studio audience. What’s at stake in this debate? The debate comes at a crucial time: after months of unfavorable poll numbers, amid referendum efforts and ahead of a September deadline for the USOC to put Boston’s bid to the International Olympic Committee. The pressure is on for Boston 2024 to drum up more public support for the bid. Last month, after the group released its “bid 2.0,” the USOC lauded the revised plan but said they were not happy with the support numbers in Boston. “We obviously want to see a positive trend, and the sooner the better,” USOC Chairman Larry Probst said after meeting with Boston 2024. Probst said the board would like to see support numbers get over 50 percent soon and ultimately in the mid-60s range before the IOC votes for the host city in 2017. The latest WBUR poll, out earlier this month, found statewide support for the Olympics at 42 percent, while Boston area support for the games was at 40 percent. Here’s a look at statewide poll numbers in recent months: Here’s a look at Boston area poll numbers in recent months: The USOC could potentially drop Boston as its candidate for the 2024 games if support does not increase to its liking. In terms of the international competition, polling isn’t the only factor, but higher support numbers would certainly help the USOC in its efforts to put Boston up against cities like Paris, Rome and Hamburg, Germany. There are also efforts underway to make sure the public gets to vote on whether or not to host the games. Last week, a group of Massachusetts residents called the Olympics Ballot Coalition filed a petition to get a referendum on hosting the 2024 Olympics (http://www.wbur.org/ Photo: https://www.prlog.org/ End
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