Olympics in Boston: Just Say No

(I’ve just sent this letter, or a slightly tweaked version of it, to Mayor Walsh; Councilors Ciommo, Wu, Pressley, Flaherty, and Murphy; Senator Brownsberger; Representative Honan; Governor Patrick; Senators Warren and Markey; and Representative Capuano.)

Dear [title] [name],

I have lived in Boston since 1989. I have been a homeowner here, in Brighton, since 1997. My wife and I have five children, all of whom were born in Boston, and two of whom are in Boston Public Schools. We are Bostonians. And we absolutely, positively, do not want Boston to host the Olympics in 2024.

We do not have enough space. We do not have enough roadway capacity. We do not have enough public transportation capacity. We do not have enough housing capacity. We do not need to spend, literally, billions of dollars constructing facilities which will end up abandoned and unused after the party is over. We do not need years of construction disruption that will make the Big Dig look like a toddler digging in a sandbox.

Boston has nothing to prove; we are already a world-class city. Hosting the Olympics will in the end make us less so rather than more.

One cannot ignore the fact that the International Olympic Committee and Boston do have one thing in common: corrupt governance. It is impossible to ignore the fact that the head of the Boston Olympics exploratory committee, John Fish, is the CEO of a construction company that would earn billions in revenue were the Olympics to be hosted here. It is impossible to ignore the fact that our mayor is beholden to  the unions, whose members would also benefit financially from a Boston Olympics.

The problems I, and many others, foresee are hardly unique to Boston. In their current form, the Olympics don’t benefit ANY city, state, or country in which they are hosted. They have become bloated and corrupt, and this sickness will only begin to heal when the IOC can no longer find any city willing to host the Olympics in their current form.

For the good of Boston and the good of the Olympics, I implore you to oppose the effort to bring them to Boston in 2024.

Sincerely,

Jonathan Kamens