Report outlines risk of Boston 2024 Olympic Games

The report was intended to discern the feasibility, or lack thereof, of Boston playing host to the 2024 Summer Olympic Games.

An over-reliance on securing private financial commitments to construct the Athletes’ Village and Midtown areas was one of the main risks of their failed bid, the report found.

“Local and state government agencies would have experienced increased overtime costs related to planning and organizing the Games”, added the report, which was put together by the Brattle Group, a consulting firm.

Boston 2024 had projected venue construction costs would total about $918 million out of a proposed $4.6 billion plan.

Though Boston 2024’s Olympics bid ended three weeks ago, economists at the Cambridge-based Brattle Group continued their commissioned analysis, which Gov. Charlie Baker, House Speaker Robert DeLeo and Senate President Stan Rosenberg released on Tuesday. “The taxpayers of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts would be the ultimate risk bearers”. The state contract with The Brattle Group was capped at $250,000.

Some Olympics opponents agreed: “The healthy skepticism expressed by voters and leaders in the State House was warranted”, the No Boston Olympics groups said in a statement.

Their deep dive into the bid’s risks and costs arrives almost a month after the U.S. Olympic Committee and the city called it quits. “Massachusetts dodged a bullet”. Evan Falchuk, a former gubernatorial candidate who led the push for a ballot referendum that would effectively prevent state taxpayer dollars from being used on the games, questioned why it took so long for the elected leaders to come to the conclusion. But seeing as how the USOC opted out of Boston, the report now provides retrospective insight into whether or not advocacy group Boston 2024 was honest and accurate in its portrayal of the bid to the general public.

Through a spokeswoman, Boston Mayor Marty Walsh, an early booster of the bid, said the concerns in the report mirrored some of the questions he had.