By DAVE EISENSTADTER
@DaveEisen
Daily Hampshire Gazette
NORTHAMPTON — Andrew Zimbalist, a Smith College economics professor and one of the most outspoken opponents of Boston’s 2024 Olympics bid, said Tuesday he was offered a consulting gig with the Boston 2024 Olympic bid group — a claim that Boston 2024 officials quickly denied.
Zimbalist said that three weeks ago, when Stephen Pagliuca assumed the chairmanship of the Boston 2024 board of directors, Pagliuca gave him a call.
According to Zimbalist, Pagliuca — managing director at Bain Capital and co-owner and managing partner of the Boston Celtics — told him that Zimbalist’s 2015 book, “Circus Maximus: The Economic Gamble Behind Hosting the Olympics and World Cup,” provided a “road map” of how to navigate a successful bid to host the Olympics.
“I said, ‘Thanks Steve, I don’t think the project is viable; I don’t think it can be done,’?” Zimbalist told the Gazette.
Zimbalist first mentioned that conversation during an interview Tuesday with Boston Public Radio.
In a statement issued in the wake of the radio interview, though, Boston 2024 chief operating officer Erin Murphy said Zimbalist was not offered a job, and called his claim “completely false.”
“After being named chair, Steve reached out to a number of people to solicit their opinions including Mr. Zimbalist,” Murphy said. “During that conversation, Steve made it clear he was interested only in voluntary feedback with the goal to ensure that Boston 2024 conducted a full review of the benefits and risks of hosting the Olympic Games.”
Zimbalist said Pagliuca’s repeated calls did not get to the point of a solid job offer because he consistently turned down the offer to get involved.
Zimbalist said he would have joined a team that was investigating whether it made sense to host the Olympics in Boston in 2024, but he said that is not the purpose of Boston 2024.
“This is a team that is not making an intellectual inquiry. Its’ reason for existence is to make this happen. They will say and do whatever they think they need to do and I don’t want to be part of that kind of a propaganda effort,” Zimbalist said.
Zimbalist told the Gazette in February that he thought the idea of Boston hosting the 2024 Olympics was “crazy.” He said at the time that the high price tag would not only negatively affect Boston, but the rest of the state as well.
“We’ll be forgotten,” he said of western Massachusetts residents. “For sure we’ll be forgotten, except as citizens of the state we’ll wind up with some of the tax burden.”
Zimbalist said London’s experience with hosting the Summer Olympics in 2012 was that it cost $18 billion and that 80 percent of that was public money. He said he expected that the cost for Boston would be similar.
Earlier this month, Gov. Charlie Baker, House Speaker Robert DeLeo and Senate President Stanley Rosenberg of Amherst announced the selection of Cambridge consulting firm The Brattle Group to conduct an independent analysis of the potential impacts of a Boston-hosted Olympic Games.
That analysis will be completed by mid-August, according to a statement issued by the governor’s office.
Dave Eisenstadter can be reached at [email protected].
