Cost overruns could limit Olympic pageantry

WASHINGTON (AP) - Salt Lake Olympic chief Mitt Romney says the costs of the Olympic Games are growing out of control and the pageantry surrounding the games should be scaled back.

Romney, responding to a new General Accounting Office report, said he plans to give International Olympic Committee President Jacques Rogge a series of recommendations to keep costs down.

The GAO, Congress' auditing agency, said the 2002 Winter Olympics are expected to cost $1.9 billion.

By comparison, the last Winter Olympics in the United States, held at Lake Placid, N.Y., cost just $363 million when adjusted for inflation, a near sixfold increase, the GAO said.

Romney said Salt Lake's Paralympic Games, which are now held in conjunction with the Olympic Games, will have more competitors, spectators and events than the Lake Placid Olympics.

Some of the costs are unavoidable, Romney wrote. For example, he said more accurate timing devices cost more, and the Salt Lake organizers will be spending $291 million on computer systems.

Romney said that since he took over as president of the Salt Lake Organizing Committee in 1999, he carved $200 million from the budget and worked to keep costs down.

"(We) sought to reverse the trend of having each Olympic Games be `bigger and better' than the one before," he said. "Our goal, instead, is to refocus the games on the basics of sport. ... The surrounding elements of the games - the pageantry and many associated programs - we've sought to reduce and eliminate whenever possible."

He said other costs could be eliminated "if the games were structured differently, beginning with the bid process."

The GAO report, requested by Sen. Bob Bennett, R-Utah, found that taxpayers will pay for $342 million of the Salt Lake Olympic budget. That doesn't include an additional $34.5 million in additional security costs.