Christy Fan

Then Harper had better increase the numbers of the F-35s to well past the crummy 65 he ordered....

But regarding Olympic (and G-20) security, I think other nations have spent about 1/10th what we have to achieve the same thing.

The authorities had to make

The authorities had to make a big show of security to show how important they were. Heck it was just our money. They managed to hire just about anyone who claimed to me a security person. What a mess, and then they went on to do it again at the G20( fake lake and all)Lets try feeding poor kids sometime soon

Military Security Industrial Complex

Just added the private corporate hired armies to the group!

I wouldn't want to be the one deciding this

The fact is that if nothing happens, any amount of money you spend is considered "wasteful". If something happens, no matter how much you spend it will be considered "not enough".
The police take the easy road: they ask for the World and say that anything short of that will put us in danger. The ones deciding on the budget have the unenviable task of deciding the final number.
I do think that $900M sounds excessive (though the CF18s coming in and out looked cool). But if something real had happened people wouldn't be saying that, they would be saying "why didn't we do more?"
And to imply, as it this article does, that the fact that there were no credible threats was reason enough to not spend it: to mobilize this kind of effort takes weeks if not months. No one would have given us a warning 6 months ahead that they were planning on doing something so we could prepare appropriately.

The fact of the matter is that the US (and the World in general) was caught completely off guard by the events of Sept11, and now they have a predictable knee-jerk reaction to overdoing everything ever since. This is no different than after the Vancouver riots of '94, when the police decided for the next 3-4 years that if 3 people were talking to each other on Robson St, that that was a potential riot in the making and had to be broken up...
I think that, like the '94 one, eventually people slowly go back to feeling safer, and the police starts getting more "no"s in response to their absurd budget requests. Until then, we either all stop having any sort of collective events, or waste some extra $$$ in security

RickW

You've got a source to back those numbers up, I suppose?

Cowardly terrorists

The US Department of Defense Dictionary of Military Terms defines terrorism as:

The calculated use of unlawful violence or threat of unlawful violence to inculcate fear; intended to coerce or to intimidate governments or societies in the pursuit of goals that are generally political, religious, or ideological.

Bin Laden of course fits into this category but so does George Bush. The invasion of Iraq was a terrorist act according to his own military.

From now on let's keep ALL the terrorists out of Canada.

You cannot put a price on deterence

Nuff said.

From Wikipedia - for snert

Snert responds to:
RickW

Quote:
But regarding Olympic (and G-20) security, I think other nations have spent about 1/10th what we have to achieve the same thing.

Snert:
You've got a source to back those numbers up, I suppose?

Wikipedia article
The total costs of the games was 7.4 billion Norwegian krone (NOK), of which NOK 0.95 billion was expenditure by the ministries, NOK 4.48 billion was for operations and event expenses, and NOK 1.67 billion was for investments.[9] The games had a revenue of NOK 2.71 billion, of which NOK 1.43 billion was from television rights, NOK 0.65 billion was from sponsors, and NOK 0.15 billion was from ticket sales.[10]
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1994_Winter_Olympics

1994 exchange rate Norway Krone to USD
January 1, 1994:
.145KR = 1 USD

.145 X 7.4 = 1.073

Total cost of 1994 Olympics (including security):

$1.073 billion USD X 1.48 (inflation rate 1994-2010)
http://www.dollartimes.com/calculators/inflation.htm

Total cost of 1994 L'il Hammer Olympics in USD adjusted for inflation:

S1.6 Billion

Snert, at that amount, one could provide security and fall $200 million short to build the Convention Centre. None of the rest of $6-7 billion in venues (sliding centre, skating oval, & other ice sheets) Olympic Village and highway upgrades etc. would have been possible. We will be paying for this foolishness for a long time.

Just Nothing Like 20/20 Hindsight.

In fact THERE WERE "credible threats" that were dealt with ahead of time, in Ottawa and Toronto. BUT there is always the "Did we get them all?" Nobody has a crystal ball, however, the primary responsibility of government is the safety and well being of it's citizens and that is exactly what security forces were tasked to provide. They did the very best job they could while still allowing people to be relatively free to enjoy and participate in the event.

The right or wrong of holding the Olympics is an entirely different question and is "beating a dead horse".

Sharing.........

So, is it YOUR contention that 1994 and 2010 are very similar in world geopolitical environments and the threat of global terrorism is/was also very similar? Did Norway have, in fact, a number of "students" intending to cause death and injury to as many people as possible at various venues during their Olympics? In 1994 was there an active world-wide terrorist organization that the Norwegians had to account for?

No? Go figure.

perspective

$1 billion in security divided by 2500 atheletes yeilds a security cost of:
$400,000 per athelete.

Just imagine how much $400,000 could have helped 2500 communities improve their sporting and atheletic programmes.

When multiplied by 7 (the total cost of the Olympics), that would equal $2,800,000 for 2500 Canadian communities.

Are there even 2500 communities of 5000 or more people in Canada...in BC?

If the $7 billion were spent just in BC, imagine the sporting programmes we would have? Instead, overall funding for sporting and amature athelete programmes from 2002 through post-2010 Olympics has decreased under our BC Liberals. Don't be fooled by government shell games, they have given increased funding to sport in some ways while clawing back in others. Over-all funding has decreased.

cboo44, pre-9-11& post-9-11

After 9-11, security at all North American Airports and border crossings increased. Those costs did increase security and are not even included in the extra security costs of the Olympics. Yes, there were active world-wide terrorist organisations in Europe during the L'il Hammer Olympics. Remember the 1972 Munich Massacre?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1972_Summer_Olympics
Yes, the Europeans had terrorists.
The cost of the Vancouver Olympics was extravagant by all measures. Yes, the world loved it, but since the federal, provincial and municiple governments have been in deficits ever since, I consider the 2010 Olympics a luxury with no payback, not a need. In fact, my children and grandchildren will probably be paying for an Olympics that their family could not afford to attend when it was here.

the will of the majority

Why can't people accept that *there was a referendum* in Vancouver, and *the majority* voted in favour of the Olympics ? Stop living in the past !

SharingIsGood says:
"When multiplied by 7 (the total cost of the Olympics), that would equal $2,800,000 for 2500 Canadian communities."

Right, so it was $7B that blew up in smoke right ? We dismantled the sea-to-sky highway, the convention centre, Canada Line, and all of the venues after the games. Plus, no revenue came in to offset costs right ? That is some mightly simplist yet wrong math you've done here.
You can disagree with what the money was spent on - and the referendum says you're the minority. I think that many good things came out of the games that would have never happened otherwise. e.g.
http://www.news1130.com/news/local/article/206087--sea-to-sky-highway-accidents-down

http://www.canada.com/vancouversun/news/westcoastnews/story.html?id=8a407560-f378-41f4-8e59-ffab044488f4

As for the actual topic of this article: I still think that the cost of the security is considered excessive because nothing of particular alarm happened. If only we could crystal ball our way into deciding these things with the benefit of hindsight...

HUH? So, NOW you say 1972, 1994 and 2010 were comparable ?

As far as security threats were concerned? I'm sorry, you are very wrong, period. 1972 was a specific and direct threat and yes, I remember it very well. There was one identified potential threat in 1994, TO THE LONE ISRAELI COMPETITOR ! But to attempt to compare the security needs for past Olympics to the 2010 Games is just grasping at straws.

Rightly or wrongly, we held the Olympics. It was our responsibility to provide proper a sufficient security for everyone. As in any large-scale operation there are oversights that must be addressed. As in all large operations there are over-runs due to unplanned additions.
Such contingencies are not conspiracies or incompetence. "Stuff happens" and must be dealt with. All the bases have to be covered. It is the authorities responsibility.
As I initially posted, 20/20 hindsight is a easy nitpicking and virtually invalid.

elbillug - cboo44

elbillug:
Why can't people accept that *there was a referendum* in Vancouver, and *the majority* voted in favour of the Olympics ? Stop living in the past.

I don't live in Vancouver nor even in the Lower Mainland, so get it through your head that I am paying for your effin' resources and upgrades. I'm not living in the past. I am making a statement about what your Vancouver/Whistler Olympics costs taxpayers now and in the future. If we don't use a bit of hindsight, we are destined to repeat the same mistakes in the future.

Well Cboo44 who said:
"Rightly or wrongly, we held the Olympics. It was our responsibility to provide proper a sufficient security for everyone. As in any large-scale operation there are oversights that must be addressed. As in all large operations there are over-runs due to unplanned additions."

The security estimate post 9-11 was $175,000,000 - not $900 million to $1 billion. The BC Libs and VANOC made a security cost projection that was about 1/5th the actual cost. What insanity! The cost for the 2002 Turin, Italy Winter Olympics was $1.3 Billion. Yes, it was more than the final tab in BC, but the Al Queda type terrorists that we were guarding against did not have land access to Canada. It's not like there are trains and roads and planes from all over Europe and Aisa that have access to Canada. One would certainly think if they expected to have to provide security like they did in Turin, they'ld have had their figures correct from the start.

Any business that operated a budget the way the BC Liberals and VANOC did would have been bancrupt before the event even got off the ground. They were either financial idiots or con artists, it can't have been any other way.

SharingIsGood

Despite your id, you don't like to share much do you :-)
So you are against public transportation improvements, road improvements, public facilities improvements because they weren't in your location of residence, and yet you speak of how much you'd like all of this money to be poured into Canada... What other projects done in places you don't live in do you disapprove of ? A quick search through big capital projects in Canada right reveals a lot of them. These 2 added together cost more than the $7B olympic bill (which I haven't heard of, but I won't bother contesting):

http://top100projects.ca/2010/eglington-crosstown-light-rail-transit-lrt-project/

http://top100projects.ca/2010/chum-centre-hospitalier-de-l%E2%80%99universite-de-montreal-redevelopment/

You don't mention where you live, but I'm sure your community/village/city is completely self-sufficient and receives no money from any level of government which I pay into, correct ? Shall we compare numbers, because I know the lower mainland contributes a vast amount to provincial and federal coffers.
I'm sorry that you took no pleasure in the olympics, in the way Canada beautifully came together, in how (most) everyone celebrated our achievements, and that now you can't get over the fact that it went through even though you were against it. I must say I did enjoy it, and the capital projects were necessary regardless of the olympics - the olympics just served as an awesome catalyzer for them.
And to blame the olympics for any mismanagement done by the government is completely lopsided. Any mismanagement that happened didn't happen because of the olympics, or are you of the opinion that the olympics is the only project ever mismanaged ?

Around and Around

We can be absolutely certain that there was more, much more to the Olympics Security story than just this tabloid snippet.

Posters suggesting that this was run by the BC government or by VANOC just do not know how things work in this new international world. No idea.

The cost was for Canada, not just BC.

We are aware of some people that were employed during the Olympics, for extended lengths of time. This was better than doing nothing and therefore a job-creation project for them. One drove a truck, another was on his feet all day checking people, bags and perimeters. They will be paying taxes on their earnings, as well as spending their earnings within BC. Just money sloshing around.

Security is just like insurance. We all pay it and if we don't have a claim it feels a bit like money down the drain. Of course, if we do have a claim, or a situation, we are so proud of ourselves and so pleased that we bought for it.

All complainers that constantly and continually moan that the Games cost "x" billions, while ignoring the facilities and civic infrastructure constructed, as well as the legacy projects and the value of editorial PR are simply unable to think objectively because they are obsessively morose over a now-retired premier that upset their ideological mania. Sad. Which is what they like to be.

Foreign snoops give me the creeps even more than our own

Why the hell were American diplomats playing their ridiculous spy games here anyway? Keeping an eye on housing activists, on people who responded peacefully to infringements on our rights and freedoms under the charter. Ugly Americans sneaking around, scribbling entries into their little note books, passing them along to their messed up State Department (that one's for you, Hillary). It's rather unbecoming. No wonder it took ten years to find and kill Osama, what with all of those resources being wasted on those dangerous anti-homelessness protesters. I don't believe he's dead, anyway. No photos, no video (even though Obama is supposed to have watched it all go down in real time), no body (buried at sea - how convenient).

With McDonald's, General Electric, Coca-Cola, General Motors, VISA and so on, it's not difficult to understand why those well-paid diplomats wrote those "situation reports." It's all about brand protection, not wanting the world to see how an Olympic Tent Village measures up against the $1.1b failure that is the Vancouver Olympic Village.

I recall how Jacques Rogue said if Vancouver included women's ski jumping in the 2010 Games against his wishes, there would never be another Olympics in Canada. Big mistake we made, not letting the women take flight.

The interior does share, elbillug

Trouble is, the inhabitants in the Interior contribute more to provincial coffers than comes back to them and their communities money and services. This has been proven over and again on these blogs, so please, give up the holier than thou refrain... it doesn't work.

You see, for sharing to work properly, then the Lower Mainland and Victoria have to share more than the their bills. For all of the mining, ranching and logging my communitiy does, it gets next to nothing back. We've used provincial stats to work it out. You see, hay seeds like us (though we don't employ screwball Olympic cost and estimate methods) know how to balance books. And, we know when the books are stacked against us - take for instance the way the BC Libs with Christy Clark sold the money-making BC Rail (that used to service a good number of Interior communities that not being visited by CN).

errata

My apologies, I need a grammar nasi.

*communities money and services
communities [in] money and services

*share more than the their bills
share more than their [unpaid] bills

*Interior communities that not being visited by CN).
Interior communities that [are] not being visited by CN).

Why can't people accept that

Why can't people accept that *there was a referendum* in Vancouver, and *the majority* voted in favour of the Olympics ? Stop living in the past !

==========

The whole Lower mainland or the whole province should of gotten a vote.

elbillug: I just visited your two links.

I just visited your two links.

1. the link to the sea to sky hiway showing fewer fatalities was nice to read. I'm all for public safety and peole not being hurt. How about the folks who use that highway payihg a toll like we had to in the Interior for 20 years? The only resaon the tolls were removed from the Coquihalla was that the Premier was facing a revolt after he said he was going to continue the tolls and privatize their collection. The people working at the tollbooths had no idea they were going to be looking for a job the next day when Gordon Campbell showed up with a Backhoe and began tearing apart a tollbooth for a photo op. How was that for planning ahead?! What a joke!

2. Yea, some hospital construction news - another sad joke in my part of the world. The city nearest to me had it's hospital (with operating theatres and expensive equipment) downgraded to a band-aid station under the BC Liberals. The people of the town fund-raised for years and years to build and equip that hospital only to find the equipment they bought and donated shipped off to the big city hospital an hour up the high mountain road. For people like my family, it's now nearer to an hour and a half up the road - maybe longer in the winter. Thanks for less than nothing! More good ole Lower Mainland sharing!

Thanks wikileaks

Another valuable service, providing more cannon fodder for the immature and brainless to get wound up about.

Despite the utter lack of credibility of any kind of threat, the scare-mongers who believe "bigger is better" found it necessary to scare the media and the government into a bigger security operation than we needed.

Well, I'm glad it kept these otherwise unemployable fops off the breadlines for a few years.

Too bad their progeny are now out tasering immigrants at airports, for want of any real criminals to find. Shit, if they'd just ask me I could find 'em some!

Thank God it was only a $1 billion that went south

We have another $13 billion where that came from; anything to build more prisons and turn Canada into Herr Harper's Fatherland.

I wonder how many times parliament will be suspended in the next four years? Will we ever vote again? Think ye I jest?

How many billions will go to buying F35 jets not yet built or designed?

Think ye not of the other uses of these billions, but of the Great Glory of our Glorious Fuehrer.

It really IS "The Harper Government" now, and don't you forget it!

We was robbed!

The infrastructure improvements people are falling back on in this unbelievable defense of government placing public dollars into private hands were part of that ridiculous public/private partnership that saw PCL charge us double for pretty much everything they touched.

Why don't we have a referendum on polygamy exclusively in the Christian Valley? That would be as reflective of public sentiment as the "referendum" on the people of BC's desire to host the olympics.

Considering how much the entire province sacrificed for this event, we got very, very little in return.