The day after the block across from Pioneer Park was chosen as the site for a $3.7 million speed-skating oval, opponents of the decision began their campaign to defeat the project at the polls.
Tim Funk, acting director of the Crossroads Urban Center, said he and other opponents will decide soon how to time a petition drive aimed at allowing city voters the option of cutting off funding for any Olympic venues within the city."Getting a petition signed is no problem," he said, noting opponents would need about 10,000 signatures to force a vote.
It took members of the Utah Sports Authority eight hours Wednesday to make Block 49 their first choice, after listening to presentations from the four communities competing for the project as well as public testimony.
In an unusual move, the 12-2 vote also named the Oquirrh Park Fitness Center in Kearns as the alternate choice if the Sports Authority is unable to negotiate an agreement with Salt Lake City in the next 60 days.
That's not likely to happen, according to Sports Authority chairman Randy Dryer. "The deal was made. What remains to be negotiated are the details of an operating agreement," he said.
Dryer said the decision to name both a preferred site and an alternate will be an incentive to Salt Lake City to come to terms on such issues as fee collection, operating hours and how the facility will fin
See OVAL on B2
ally look.
Salt Lake Mayor Deedee Cor-radini, who endured most of the daylong meeting that dragged on until 4:30 p.m., said the city would be able to reach an agreement within the 60-day time limit set by the Sports Authority.
Corradini also predicted she would be able to soothe many of the concerns raised by opponents about displacing a low-income housing development and cultural center.
But Funk said the only way opponents can be soothed is by Corradini finding a different site or by the public vote. Opponents are angry because the city had promised to build housing on the block that would include 38 apartments for low-income people.
While Corradini proposes housing around the oval, she has made no promise to include low-income units.
Funk said he and others behind the petition drive don't oppose the Olympics, they just don't want the oval to interfere with the needs of the city's poor. But he said the referendum may be perceived as a vote on whether people support the Games.
"We don't want to put the city out of the Olympics business, but it might come down to that," he said.
Nearly half of the 40 or so area residents who testified at the meeting opposed the Block 49 site. Almost as many said they favored the Kearns fitness center site, and only a handful spoke in favor of Block 49.
Support for the downtown Salt Lake block came from members of the business community, including Salt Lake Area Chamber of Commerce executive director Fred Ball.
Ball said the chamber endorsed the Block 49 site because it would help bring economic development to the area. He said he has not seen housing advocates clamoring for the completion of an apartment complex started there years ago.
But Debbie Bettess, who spoke from her wheelchair on behalf of the blind community, said the Sports Authority should "consider all people's feelings"' before choosing a site.
"It's not just the mayor's city. It's not just Fred Ball's city. It's all of our city," Bettess said. She added a plea that the speed-skating oval be made accessible to the handicapped.
Backers of the Oquirrh Park Fitness Center site included a number of children who said they would be able to skate more if the speed-skating oval were built in their neighborhood.
"There's, like, not as many kids out here (Salt Lake City) who could just go and skate and walk there without their parents driving them," 9-year-old Mike Martin said.
His father, Stephen, waved a handful of speed-skating medals won at the Utah Winter Games by Mike and his 15-year-old brother, Scott, and said he would not bring his sons downtown to skate regularly because of the traffic congestion.
The oval should be built where it would be used the most, he and others told the Sports Authority. "The west side of the valley has nothing. We want the speed-skating oval," Stephen Martin said.
Officials of the Oquirrh Park Fitness Center were disappointed by the vote. "We thought the decision would be a little bit closer," said Glen Kraft, chairman of the center's board.
Business and political interests swayed the vote, Kraft said. "The community and the kids' side got left out," he said. The center is still ready to negotiate if the Salt Lake deal falls through.
The referendum effort first surfaced at a meeting Corradini had with handicapped residents last week. However, the mayor said Wednesday she hadn't heard about it and wasn't concerned.
But she said she was not surprised. "Anytime you try to site a facility like this in a downtown area, an urban area, you're going to have controversy," Corradini said.
The Sports Authority, the state agency responsible for constructing $59 million in winter sports facilities that would be used in Olympic competition if Salt Lake City is awarded the 2002 Winter Games, is not paying for every-thing.
It is putting up $3.7 million to build the oval plus an additional $1.1 million to operate it through 2002. There will be more money to cover the oval and make other improvements if Salt Lake City gets the Games.
Salt Lake City recently estimated the cost of subsidizing the operating and maintenance costs at $138,000 annually, a figure that angered several City Council members because no one told them what it was until late Tuesday night.
The biggest concern raised at Wednesday's meeting about locating the oval on Block 49, however, was not money. It was scrapping the original plans for the block.
Gone are plans for a hotel and a cultural center, although the mayor said "affordable housing" and retail businesses would still be built around the oval.