As the members of Salt Lake City's Olympic bid delegation heard the news of their success here Friday, Bennie Smith and Frank Richards celebrated just out of the spotlight, as is their custom. They'd given no speeches during Friday morning's official presentation to the International Olympic Committee, and they gave no interviews at the victorious press conference Friday night.
But no one involved with Utah's bid was more valuable Friday than these two relatively anonymous diplomats. It's believed that the 54 votes that went Salt Lake City's way in the first round of balloting, providing an unexpected one-round victory, represented many of those IOC delegates assigned to Smith and Richards.While the IOC's balloting was secret, it was also no secret that the most difficult votes to get, especially in the opening round, would be from the Europeans. With the European cities of Ostersund, Sweden, and Sion, Switzerland, also in the bidding, it stood to reason that those countries geographically and culturally aligned with the Alps and Scandinavia would understandably be expected to stay loyal to their regions. Further, with fellow North American city Quebec rounding out the finalists, it followed that Salt Lake City would be in a close battle for votes from delegates who came from countries equally loyal to America/Canada.
It was the "neutral" votes in South America and Africa that Salt Lake City reasoned it needed to go over the top.
Thanks to Smith and Richards, the Utah delegates in charge of those areas of the world, it was those votes that it got.
Estimates by Olympic consultants guessed that of the 17 African votes up for grabs Friday, at least 15 and perhaps 16 went to Salt Lake City. Of the dozen Hispanic votes available, Salt Lake City probably got 11 of them. All total, that's 26 or 27 votes - roughly half of the votes Salt Lake City realized in the opening round.
"It was acknowledged that Salt Lake's weakest area would be Europe," said Mahmoud Elfarawani, an Egyptian native now living in Toronto who acted as a consultant with the Salt Lake Bid Committee. "It was the other areas that would - and did - make the difference."
Smith and Richards, both private entrepreneurs driven by Utah patriotism to get involved with the bid, were given their respective areas of "influence" several years ago by the bid committee. Smith has lobbied the IOC's African delegates the past eight years and Richards has lobbied the Hispanic delegates - in Mexico, Central and South America, as well as the Caribbean - the past six years.
Both became so good at what they did that bid committee President Tom Welch and Vice President Dave Johnson largely left each in charge of his own area.
"Make no mistake, Frank and I couldn't have done anything without Tom and Dave, and others who helped," said Smith. "They really supported us. But they also gave us a lot of responsibility."
Smith, the owner of Beneco Enterprises, a construction management and engineering firm, and Richards, who owns Republic Mortgage Corp., both contributed considerable time and personal expense to the cause. In the past eight years, Smith estimated he has gone to Africa 20 times, at his own expense, while Richards said he has made numerous trips to Central and South America and Mexico the past six years, at his own expense, including annual visits to meetings of the Pan American Sports Organization.
Richards was in Argentina this past March for the Pan American Games, where he finalized his lobbying efforts for Salt Lake City's 2002 bid. Smith spent the last three weeks before arriving in Budapest in Africa, roaming the continent from Uganda to Mali to the Ivory Coast to Swaziland.
Both say their IOC contacts have resulted in friendships that go beyond the Olympics. "I've got wives of delegates who call me their son," said Smith, who is black, "and I've got delegates themselves who call me their son. They think I'm African."
"I have developed very close, lasting friendships," said Richards. "You do this long enough and you develop strong feelings."
Both were recruited into the cause, Smith by Welch - "He told me he had to have the African vote to win," Smith remembers - and Richards by former Olympic steeplechaser Henry Marsh.
"I spoke Spanish," said Richards, who learned the language in high school and college and while serving a Mormon mission in Uruguay. "And Henry told me they needed help in that area."
Smith, who grew up in Arizona, first came to Utah when he played football at Brigham Young University from 1972 through 1974. He was a member of the first team LaVell Edwards head-coached in 1973. He went on to play in the National Football League for parts of four years, with the St. Louis Cardinals and Kansas City Chiefs, as a defensive back, before retiring from football and moving to Salt Lake City.
"I got involved (with the Olympic effort) because I want other people to see the kind of people who live in Salt Lake," said Smith, who joined the The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints while at BYU. "I want them to see the way we live. I want to get more blacks to Salt Lake. I want them to see what I have and what I feel about Salt Lake and the way people have treated me. It's a town that gives its heart to everybody. It's a town that lives the Olympic values."
Richards is a lifelong Utahn whose roots reach to the Mormon pioneers who crossed the plains. A cowboy who has a ranch in Park City and rides cutting horses in competition, he too said he felt compelled to work with the Olympic cause because of strong feelings about where he lives. "I'd like people throughout the world to become more familiar with our city and our area, to see the quality of life," he said. "And to be honest, I have to say I thought it would be a great thing for the (LDS) church."