Page 62 - 072917

Groton Daily Independent
Saturday, July 29, 2017 ~ Vol. 25 - No. 029 ~ 62 of 67
Rio’s Olympics 1 year later: The good, the bad and the ugly By STEPHEN WADE and RENATA BRITO, Associated Press
RIO DE JANEIRO (AP) — Neymar kissed the ball, delivered a gold medal and then wept with other Brazilians.
Look no further if you’re searching for an iconic image of the Rio de Ja- neiro Olympics.
“It’s the only medal that really mat- tered,” Salvador Gaeta said recently while cycling in the deserted Olympic Park. “Every Brazilian will remember it.”
Other memories have faded at home since the Olympics opened a year ago. A few expectations were met, but many fell short of those promised by IOC President Thomas Bach and orga- nizing committee head Carlos Nuzman.
Bach boasted at the closing cer- emony of “a Rio de Janeiro before, and amuchbetterRiodeJaneiroafterthe Olympic Games.”
NuzmancalledRiothenextBarce- lona, one of the cities clearly trans- formed by the games.
In this July 4, 2016 le photo, Sugar loaf mountain and GuanabarabayareseenbehindtheChristtheRedeemer statue in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. Rio organizers promised tocleanuppollutedGuanabaraBayintheirwinningbidin 2009. During the Olympics, of cials used stop-gap mea- sures to keep oating sofas, logs, and dead animals from crashing into boats during the sailing events. Since the Olympics,thebankruptstateofRiodeJaneirohasceased majoreffortstocleanthebay,withtheunwelcomestench usuallydriftingalongthehighwayfromtheinternational airport.(APPhoto/FelipeDana)
Save for minor cosmetic changes,
acityfracturedbymountainsand
searinginequalityremainsasitwas.
Violentcrimemostlyconcealedduring
theOlympicsissoaring,tiedtoBrazil’s
deepest economic downturn in 100
years and unpaid policemen leaving in droves. Brazil’s military has been called in to quell Rio’s untethered violence.
Rio barely managed to keep it together for the Olympics, needed a government bailout to hold the Para- lympics and then collapsed under a grinding recession and sprawling corruption scandals.
The games took place mostly in the south and west of the city, which remains white and wealthy. The rest is still a hodgepodge of dilapidated factories and hillside slums of cinderblocks, tin roofs and open troughs of raw sewage.
Brazil says it spent $13 billion in public and private money to organize the Olympics — some estimates suggest $20 billion — and many games-related projects since then have been tied to corruption scandals that marred the games and drove up costs. Federal police and prosecutors have linked overpriced projects to graft between politicians and construction companies.
A look at the fallout since the Olympics opened on Aug. 5:
___
THE GOOD
The Olympics left behind a new subway line extension, high-speed bus service and an urban jewel: a
renovated port area lled with food stands, musicians and safe street life in a city rife with crime.
These probably would not have been built without the prestige of the Olympics. But the games also im-