ABSTRACT
New York officially embarked on its Olympic bid in 1998, led by New York City 2012. Local activists, community leaders, and elected representatives, as well as some journalists, maintained a high level of scrutiny over the bid proceedings until its ultimate defeat in 2005, when the IOC awarded the Games to London. In September 2002, two months before the US Olympic Committee selected New York as the American contender, Newsday columnist Kathleen Brady wrote one of the few critical pieces to appear in that city's mainstream newspapers, with the heading, “Torch the Olympics and Build Housing”. In it, she questioned the spending priorities of the mayor and other elected representatives and the promised solutions to unemployment and the housing crisis that would allegedly flow from hosting the Olympics. Local activists, supported by elected representatives at the local and state levels, had been opposing the West Side stadium plans since 2000.
