Pan-Am games

Toronto won the rights to the 2015 Pan-Am games. Hoorah!

Ok sorry I know all of us here in Toronto are all supposed to be happy that Toronto finally won the rights to host a big event after years of being the brides maid and never the bride but the reality is I'm one of the ones who could care less about our hosting a big sporting event. Actually that's not true if anything I have a negative take on the whole hosting the Pa-Am games.

I think its a big waste of money. I mean as others are now saying, its not like Toronto has a lot or even any money to play with right now. The Federal and Provincial governments are running huge deficits, the local governments are penny pinching and also hitting residents with tax increases at every turn so how are we finding a billion dollars, that's right one billion dollars, to build a athletes village?

I mean the City is sticking us with a 17 dollar increase on a metropass in January, has us paying extra for garbage and waste collection the quality of which has deteriorated, have put extra taxes on renewing drivers licenses, transferring house ownerships etc etc etc all the while crying poor but has cash to spare to build locations for sporting events? I mean Arts and sports need to be supported but really?

Oh I know it grabs the headlines and makes for a great photo-op for the politicians to win the Pan-Am's games bid. Whoo hoo. Look we're bringing something to your town. But it doesn't help the average working man who probably wont be able to afford Pan -Am tickets, will be inconvenienced by it all and who will probably be footing the bill cause regardless of how much money the Feds and the Province say they are going to put in, the municipalities in the GTA will have to put some funds in too and this is just money we cant afford to put in. Why put extra tax on an already overtaxed populace.

Oh they sell it as it will increase profile and it will increase tourism. Yea isn't that the same stuff the Caribbean governments said about the Cricket World Cup two years ago. Yea tell me how that turned out.

This ain't even the Olympics. Its the Pan-Am games. How much press coverage do the Pan-Am games get? Does anyone know who won the last Pan-Am gold medal in any event? So why, in a recession, are we committing to spend so much money on an event that's like a warm up for the Olympics, the Commonwealth games and the World Games. Sporting events that actually matter.

Seriously this is silly and as a taxpayer I'm not happy about it one bit.

Oh thought of one positive. Nine months after the games the City might see a slew of babies with superior athletic genes and maybe Canada will be competitive in sports again in say 2036. Hmmm someone needs to do a study on that.