Thursday, March 28, 2024
Miles from the Mainstream
D. R. ZUKERMAN, proprietor
New York Cordiality

FEBRUARY 27, 2005 --

The Evaluation Commission of the International Olympics Committee (EC)
made a $3 million dollar visit to New York City, February 20-24, to consider its bid to host the 2012 Olympics and Paralympics.

LPR was told by a source at NYC2012, the organization submitting the New York City bid, that sponsors absorbed $2 million, with NYC2012 providing the balance.

The 2012 site is to be selected on July 6. The cities competing with New York are Paris, the current favorite, London, Madrid and Moscow.

On February 21 and 23 the EC held meetings and heard presentations at the Plaza Hotel, its New York City base.

On February 22 the EC toured proposed venues in Queens and Manhattan, and
on February 24, it toured venues in New Jersey, Brooklyn and Staten Island.


Venues are also proposed for The Bronx, including baseball at Yankee Stadium,
but there was no indication from the EC schedule given to the media that the group went to The Bronx. (Can we be sure there will be a Yankee Stadium in 2012?)

A portion of the cost of the EC visit went to media hospitality, including a reception at the Rainbow Room, February 20, lunch at Christie's, the auction house, February 21, addressed by the mayor, and an open
bar, February 22 in the media press room.


The Media Bar.


The working press - Amy Shipley, Washington Post, and George Vecsey, New York Times.


Media contact with the EC was limited to a few photo opportunities, until the February 24 press conference.

Shana outside the Queens Museum.


February 22, for example, the media followed in the wake of the EC tour of Queens venues. While NYC2012 Executive Director Jay Kriegel briefed the media at the Queens Museum, LPR spent some time with Shana, outside the museum, having decided to drive with Shana to the tour sites, rather than take one of the three buses provided to the media by NYC2012.

Dennis Davis drove one of the press buses. He also drives visiting teams to Yankee Stadium, and the Yankees too, of course, and also the Mets.

LPR is grateful to Mr. Davis for his call of support on the February 23 LPRmobile incident. This photo shows Mr. Davis at the wheel, February 22, outside Madison Square Garden.


Outside the museum, LPR was given a copy of a letter calling the NYC2012
proposal for an Olympics stadium on Manhattan's west side a "a cost-busting urban planning nightmare," that was "arrogant,misguided" and offering Queens as the site of the stadium for the 2012 Olympics.

Ms. Nawal El Moutawakel, IOC Evaluation Commission Chairwoman.


Proposed site of Olympic Stadium, on Manhattan's west side.


NYC2012 has picked a site on the west side of Manhattan for the 78,000 seat Olympic Stadium, which, according to plans, would thereafter become a multi-use facility, including home to the New York Jets football team, and owned by the Jets.

Woman holding NYC2012 flag


Selection of the stadium site was the major topic of interest for the media during the EC visit, with Mayor Bloomberg and other government leaders preferring that
the site be settled prior to the July 6 selection of the 2012 Olympics city.

Such action would, of course, turn the site over to the Jets even if the IOC did not
pick New York for 2012.


Carriage horse and birds.



Reporters also visited Arthur Ashe Stadium at the USTA National Tennis Center in Flushing Meadows Park, February 22, getting a briefing from tennis great Billie Jean King.

Tennis great Billie Jean King with the media at Arthur Ashe Stadium.


"Coach" Jay Kriegel, NYC2012 Executive Director.


International and US gymnast Hall of Famer Bart Conner on the MSG floor. LPR thanks Mr. Conner and his wife, gymnast great Nadia Comaneci, for taking time, Feb. 23 to listen to LPR's tale of woe, before going to the UN to speak at the NYC2012 February 23 media lunch. From New York, Mr. Conner and Ms. Comaneci went to Nagano, Japan for the Special Olympics World Winrter Games,
reporting to LPR that it is "great fun."


George Vecsey of The New York Times on the MSG Floor.


They also were shown the site of the
proposed Olympics Village, opposite the United Nations on the East River.

The proposed Olympic Village site on the East River.

Back on Manhattan, the media was taken to Madison Square Garden where reporters were invited by Mr. Kregel to shoot hoops on the Garden floor -- as the EC had done earlier (LPR made one of two) and then went to the Peter White studio on West 26th Street, overlooking the site of the proposed Olympics Stadium. (Mr. White told LPR that his property taxes have gone from $1800 to more than $90,000 over the past five years.)

Three smiling people - IOC Member Els van Brieda Vriesman, Deputy Mayor Daniel L. Doctoroff, IOC Evaluation Commission Chairwoman Nawal El Moutawakel.


The New York City skyline with NYC2012 banner in front.


Reporters had a chance to photograph the EC, February 22, as it boarded a ferry in Queens for a view of the city skyline and its return to Manhattan. The New York City bid has athletes traveling by boat on the Hudson River to the Olpmpics Stadium for the opening.

The media had no chance to learn, of course, if the EC was surprised at the present lack of development on the east bank of the East River, opposite Manhattan.

February 23 for the EC started with presentations from government officials who then briefed the media. LPR asked Congressman Charles B. Rangel if there is consensus on the stadium site and the Congressman answered, curtly: "I support whatever it takes."

Rep. Charles Rangel


LPR then left to return to the LPRmobile to drive Shana home, before the next lunch for the press, at the UN.

LPR took a photo of a work for sale by the artist Matthew Brzostoski.


Walking back to the car, LPR got a photo of a work sold by the painter on the Madison Avenue sidewalk, and then, going to the car, on the avenue's soutwest
corner at 65th Street, LPR found a cab parked where the LPRmobile had been --at an hour meter. The car was taken with Shana inside.

In Mayor Bloomberg's New York, when a car is missing, the presumption should be that it has been seized by a Parking Violations tow, or a city marshal executing a judgment that may not have a court or judge's name on the seizure order.

And LPR learned, nearly two hours later, through the efforts of Laz Benitez of NYC2012, and Lt. Eugene Whyte of the public information office of the NYPD, that the car was at a marshal's pound, in the Greenpoint section of Brooklyn, with Shana inside.

While LPR was at the briefing given by Mayor Bloomberg, Congressman Rangel, and Gov.Pataki, the city took the LPRmobile and Shana away.

Consequently, LPR missed the lunch at the UN, hosted by former ambassador Richard Holbrooke. Instead, LPR got Shana, who was okay, and, a bit later, the LPRmobile.

Thursday, LPR attended a briefing given in the morning by Peter Ueberroth, chairman of the United States Olympics Committee, and the press conferences, that evening, of the EC and then of NYC2012.

USOC Chairman Peter Ueberroth


Mr. Ueberroth, who headed the Los Angeles games in 1984 and was later baseball commissioner, thought the fact that New York had never hosted the Olympics might be in its favor for 2012.

The media guide for the EC visit notes that it is expected 9 million visitors would attend the 2012 Olympics in New York, and that the IOC would get more than $150 million.

During the EC press conference, LPR asked Chairwoman El Moutawakel her reaction to "The Gates." She called them "beautiful," and noted that Jeanne-Claude is from Morocco -- the chairwoman's
country.

"The Gates" exhibit in Central Park.


The EC toured part of The Gates, without
notice to the media, and apparently met Christo and Jeanne-Claude for the tour and also at Mayor Bloomberg's dinner for the EC, at his East 79th Street residence, February 23, following a concert at Jazz at Lincoln Center in the Time Warner building.

Ed Hula, founder and editor of the sports website: Around the Rings.

Mr. Hula came up to LPR, February 24, to inquire about Shana, having heard about the February 23 incident. LPR thanks Mr. Hula, here shown asking a question at the EC press conference.


Mayor Bloombeg, at the concluding IOC Evaluation Commission press conference.


At the NYC2012 press conference, LPR asked Deputy Mayor Daniel L. Doctoroff, founder of NYC2012, if the organization will continue, should the IOC not select
New York for 2012. He was noncommittal.

LPR offered the question in view of the Wednesday experience, convinced there should be some effective group to whom
ordinary citizens can turn for relief from the hard fist of New York City.

On Wednesday, police commissioner Raymond W. Kelly briefed reporters, while LPR awaited word on Shana.

NYPD Commissioner Ray Kelly.


There is no indication if the commissioner was asked about detentioin facilities for persons arrested, the numbers expected to be arrested if the games are held
in New York -- and the number of persons expected wrongfully to be arrested as well.

Bill Bradley


At a lunch for reporters, February 22, at the Waterfront Crab House, former Olympian, former U.S. senator and former basketball star Bill Bradley reminisced about his experience playing the Russians in the Olympics -- and beating them. He also said that athletes must have "discipline, courage and resilience."

LPR learned, within 24 hours, that this advice has far-wider application.

 


A New York Triumph
The Gates: Symbol of Freedom and Friendship

FEBRUARY 27, 2005 --

Long before the incident of Wednesday 23, LPR concluded that "The Gates" have the color of the "orange alert" envelopes that accompany PVB summonses.

(University of Tennessee fans might see their team's color in "The Gates.")

Even before the LPRmobile was seized, LPR regarded "The Gates" as protest against the thousands of PVB summonses that afflict drivers in
New York every day -- as if the city had this as its motto: To every driver a summons, to every car a tow.

Mayor Bloomberg, introducing Christo and
Jeanne-Claude, to the media, February 11, at the Metropolitan Museum, noted that they had sought to put" The Gates" in Central Park for more than a quarter of a century, and noted that their accomplishment showed that perseverance succeeds.

(Perhaps it also did not hurt that the mayor is a friend of Christo and Jeanne-Claude and has purchased
their artwork.)

Thank you Christo and Jeanne-Claude for your magnificent contribution to New York.

LPR is aware that you have disclaimed any intent beyond creating a work of art.

For LPR, you have provided a symbol of
freedom and friendship. For LPR The Gates represents "communion of interests and sympathy of sentiments" with the people.

From February 12 to February 27, in Central Park there were so many smiling Gates -- and so many smiling faces.





This website is updated weekly and previous articles are stored for reference. You are invited to read any of these past articles under the Archives section, by clicking on the "ARCHIVES" button on the right. If you would like to see enlargements of any of the photographs used on this website, please click on each photo. We thank you for visiting the Lonely Pamphleteer Review, and hope you come back again!