Denver’s exploratory committee for a potential Winter Olympics bid launched a public-outreach website Tuesday and has invited more than 200 people to serve on advisory groups in coming weeks.

Through in-person and online meetings, the committee — formed by Mayor Michael Hancock last month — is seeking a broad swath of public input, and quickly. By late March, when the U.S. Olympic Committee could decide whether to seek the Winter Games for a U.S. city in 2026 or 2030, Denver’s exploratory committee hopes to gauge whether Colorado — whose voters famously rejected the 1976 Winter Games — wants to be in the hunt.

Business leaders and political officials including Gov. John Hickenlooper, who helped launch the effort, sit on the 40-member exploratory committee, along with former Bronco Peyton Manning and retired Nugget Chauncey Billups.

In recent days, invites for separate metro-focused and mountain-focused “Sharing the Gold” advisory groups went out to a range of community advocates, including some skeptics of a bid.

The questions facing Colorado residents only start with whether hosting is possible here.

“The first part of the committee is to look at the ‘could,’ and the second part of the committee is to look at ‘Should we host the games?’ ” said Rob Cohen, the CEO of IMA Financial Group and chairman of the Denver Olympic and Paralympic Winter Games Exploratory Committee. “What are the benefits, what are the challenges and does it make sense for us to do it?”

Until now, the committee has considered those questions behind closed doors. In addition to the main committee, there also are five subcommittees with accountants, lawyers and other professionals looking at various aspects of the issue.

The fast pace of the committee’s work has bred some suspicion that the public’s input won’t count for much, although Cohen and other leaders say that’s not the case. One advisory group invitee contacted by The Denver Post expressed concern about the tight schedule of advisory meetings — and the short timeline for a bid decision.

“The more I think about it, the more I wonder how this committee’s participation at the eleventh hour is expected to impact the outcome,” said Christine O’Connor, who represents Denver’s Lowry neighborhood in Inter-Neighborhood Cooperation, an umbrella group for neighborhood associations. “Clearly, they are checking off some ‘box’ regarding outreach.”

Some exploratory committee leaders argue Denver and the mountain region are better suited to host the Olympics than they were in 1976, with few new venues needed for the 17-day event.

They also note that the nature of an Olympics bid has changed drastically since then — and it’s expected to change even more in the next decade, Cohen said, as the International Olympic Committee plans to streamline the bid process and share sponsorship and television-rights money totaling $950 million with the host city. The IOC also is allowing more flexibility than it has in the past and the use of temporary facilities for some sports.

Denver’s exploratory committee leaders say a bid could cost $2 billion, and their goal would be to finance the rest privately rather than seek taxpayer money.

Cohen said the committee had identified just three event venues that Colorado lacks for a bid: a ski-jumping course, a sliding hill for bobsledding and the luge, and a nordic-skiing center that, per IOC requirements, is at or below 5,800 feet in elevation. It’s exploring options for building those temporarily or permanently.

How public can weigh in

The public-outreach plan — announced by Community and Civic Engagement Subcommittee co-chair Janice Sinden, the president and CEO of the Denver Center for the Performing Arts and Hancock’s former chief of staff — has three major components:

A hundred or more people have been invited to serve on each of the two advisory groups. The metro Denver group is set to have the first of three meetings Saturday morning and the last on March 3. The mountain advisory group could meet in several locations along the Interstate 70 corridor, given how spread out that region is, Sinden said.

An online survey offers residents a chance to make suggestions or express opinions about a bid. The exploratory committee also has launched an “Explore the Games” website with more information about the potential bid.

Two hour-long “webinars,” or online meetings, will allow anyone to watch a presentation and submit feedback. The first is set for 6 p.m. Feb. 8, and the other will be at 9 a.m. Feb. 24.

Sinden said her subcommittee, co-chaired by City Council president Albus Brooks and Visit Denver president and CEO Richard Scharf, will make speakers available upon request for civic groups and other meetings.

“What we’re trying to do is … move away from the vocal minorities that may be either very for or very against (a bid), and really get a sense and a pulse for what our community at large thinks about this,” Cohen said. “At the end of the day, that’s the big aspect on the ‘should’ (question).”

There’s still uncertainty surrounding the time pressure of considering a bid, Cohen said.

Some observers say it’s less likely that the USOC will seek the 2026 Winter Games — for which the bid process kicks off this spring — since Los Angeles is hosting the 2028 Summer Games. So that could give Denver, Salt Lake City and the Reno-Tahoe area — the three cities that are considering bids — two more years to decide. Related Articles September 4, 2020 Brauchler: There should be a no-politics, no-policy zone protecting America’s stadiums and arenas

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But it’s also possible that the International Olympic Committee will consider awarding the 2026 and 2030 winter games concurrently, as it just did for the 2024 (Paris) and 2028 (L.A.) summer games.

Sinden said the exploratory committee hopes to come up with Denver’s answer for any potential Winter Games bid by March so that the process doesn’t have to be repeated.

“I’m not going to lie: I’m excited about it,” Sinden said. “But I’m excited for everything we do in this state (on a large scale). We do this, and we do it well. So what I want to hear is: ‘Why not?’ ”

But, she added: “If the public clearly says ‘Too much’ or ‘Not now,’ we’re prepared for that information. There’s no preconceived outcome. I’m not going to lie that there’s hope — there is. This work has been going on for decades.”

Exploratory committee roster