IOC Panel Concludes Its Visit to New York

Stadium Deal Seen as Key Element in Bid

NEW YORK, Feb. 24 -- The International Olympic Committee evaluation team that this week reviewed New York's bid for the 2012 Summer Games revealed little about its four-day visit during today's concluding news conference, but it did make one thing perfectly clear:

Reaching a deal that would ensure the construction of the proposed -- and highly controversial -- Olympic stadium over New York's West Side Rail Yards before the July 6 IOC vote to award the 2012 Games is critical to New York's chances of toppling Paris, London, Madrid and Moscow.

"We need a stadium," IOC evaluation team chair Nawal Moutawakel of Morocco said. "We have been [given] an assurance that the stadium will be there."

The stadium deal, however, is far from sealed and the issue is at least a month away from resolution.

Moutawakel's surprisingly frank remarks likely will heighten the tension over the bid team's $1.6 billion plan not only to convert the West Side Rail Yards into a stadium for the New York Jets and the Olympics but also to extend the current convention hall.

New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg, a staunch bid supporter, said when asked about Moutawakel's comments that he thought New York would get the stadium.

"I think we will," he said. "I think the stadium is the right thing for New York City."

Earlier today, however, New York City Council Speaker Gifford Miller spoke out in opposition to the plan and protesters assembled outside the offices of the Metropolitan Transportation Authority to air concerns about it. The MTA, which controls the land, won't decide to whom to sell it until after March 21, the final day of a month-long open bidding process.

"The Mayor's obsession with building a Jets stadium continues to undercut the true value of this land and prevent other interested parties from bidding on equal footing," Anna Levin, the first vice-chair of Community Board 4, said in a statement. "It is unconscionable that the Mayor and the Governor continue to stand in the way of what is best for New York and the MTA."

The stadium controversy dominated the headlines during the IOC team's five-day visit, despite hopes by New York bid officials that they would be able to put the finishing touches on a deal before the evaluators' arrival. An unexpected bid for the West Side land by Madison Square Garden two weeks ago ended the Jets' exclusive negotiations with the MTA and threw the Olympic plans into arrears. After receiving the Madison Square Garden bid of $600 million -- the Jets had offered just $100 million -- the MTA decided to open the process to other bidders.

Switzerland's Gilbert Felli, another member of the 13-person evaluation team, said the IOC had become more firm in its determination to ensure commitments to construction plans since 2000. New York bid leader Dan Doctoroff repeatedly has said that the New York bid team has no backup plan for an Olympic stadium.

The controversy is especially troubling for New York given its underdog status to begin with. The IOC historically has favored cities that have bid at least once and lost, and this is New York's first attempt. Paris, which bid unsuccessfully for the 1992 and 2008 Summer Games, is considered the favorite. London also has bid previously. And Paris, which has held major track and field championships and the 1998 soccer World Cup, possesses all major venues.

The IOC has only once previously awarded an Olympics to a first-time bidder: in 1989, it gave Atlanta the 1996 Summer Games.

Moutawakel lauded New York's other venues, particularly Madison Square Garden -- which has agreed to hold the Olympic basketball competition -- and the USTA National Tennis Center at Flushing Meadow.

"The existing infrastructure is something that is very important to us," she said.

Moutawakel added that if a deal is not in place by June 6, the day the IOC evaluation team turns over its technical analysis of the five bids to the 100-plus member IOC, the stadium will be discussed in the report as a risk to the bid's success.

"Hopefully they will get this on the West Side," she said. "Otherwise, it is a risk assessment."