Mayor Backs L.A.’s Bid for 2016 Games

Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa pledged his full support Wednesday as Los Angeles became the first U.S. entrant into the race for the 2016 Summer Olympic Games.

“I stand ready, willing, able and excited about bidding for the 2016 Games,” Villaraigosa said at a news conference in the courtyard of the Amateur Athletic Foundation, a legacy of the $232.5-million profit generated by the 1984 Summer Games.

As in 1984, the Games would be privately financed and a significant surplus is all but assured.

The bid kicked off with a nod to the civic tradition the Games have represented in Southern California, the site of the 1932 and 1984 Summer Olympics.

Peter Vidmar, a gymnast who won a gold medal in 1984, said he had found tucked into a book a $2 general admission ticket his father, John, had used to attend the track and field events at the Coliseum at 2:30 p.m. on Aug. 1, 1932.

“The nice thing is, L.A. does it right,” Peter Vidmar said.

But Vidmar and others, including swimming star Janet Evans and businessman Casey Wasserman -- among those Villaraigosa called a “new generation of Angelenos” backing the bid -- acknowledged that organizers must give Olympic leaders a reason to come back to Los Angeles a third time.

Perhaps, some suggested, the answer can be found in the entertainment industry.

“Past bids have not embraced the Hollywood community the way they should,” said Carl Borack, a film producer and former Olympic fencer. “This time, Hollywood would love to get involved. They just need to be asked, told how best to use their talents, energy and creativity.”

The U.S. Olympic Committee will choose its bid city in 2007, with the International Olympic Committee deciding two years later on the 2016 site. Chicago, San Francisco and Washington are likely U.S. rivals. Possible international challengers include Rio de Janeiro.