‘Why pay Tucker & Associates $250K’
While admitting he hasn’t really thoroughly studied the Tucker & Associates report, NMASA Hall of Fame inductee Bill Sakovich said he has mixed thoughts about paying the company an additional $250,000 to lobby the CNMI and Guam as training sites for the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing.
“I don’t think we should pay Tucker & Associates $250,000 to lobby for us and Guam. I think it’s a good idea. But what’s the guarantee that [after giving $250,000] these teams would come here,” said the former Northern Marianas Amateur Sports Association president and secretary general of the South Pacific Games Council.
Sakovich, who relocated to Hilo, Hawaii in May last year after living on Saipan for more than 30 years, said it would be more practical and much more cheaper if representatives from the Commonwealth themselves do the lobbying to the National Governing Bodies.
“I have really mixed thoughts on saying that we should pay somebody else to lobby for us. Hell, let me do it, it costs me a lot less than $125,000 [The CNMI’s portion]. There’s enough Chamorros there [in the states], why can’t they do it?” he said. “Do we want somebody to that for us? Give him $250,000 to campaign for that? Can’t we just make some videos, write some letters, and if congressman this is going, or whoever it is, ‘hey stop by at Colorado Springs and talk to the triathlon federation or to whatever federation.’ It’s a lot cheaper.”
If the Babauta administration still goes ahead and pay Tucker & Associates, Sakovich said the CNMI shouldn’t split the $250,000 cost with Guam because it is already a given that the U.S. territory would get the lion’s share of the teams coming to the Mariana Islands for acclimation training.
“We’re not getting as much [sports] as Guam would get. Numbers-wise, facilities-wise, they just got more to offer. Okay it’s worth it to put our efforts to get a couple of facilities, yes. But we’re not going to get the baseball, we’re not going to get the softball, we’re not going to get the soccer, we’re not going to get swimming. Leo Palace has all that stuff without me even thinking. The facilities [on Guam] are ready and they’re beautiful. We may get triathlon, wind surfing, some of those other out-of-the-way sports. If we could only give $50,000 and Guam $200,000 I would say ‘let’s do it,’” he said.
Sakovich even has doubts how big, marketing wise, the impact of Olympians coming over to train here prior to the Beijing Olympic Games would be to the Commonwealth.
“Will we get $250,000 worth in facilities and media coverage? Yes we may. But it’s not going to be like when the Japanese [Kentetsu] Buffalo were here bringing with them 5,000 media people. They were all around here, shooting stuff here. We’ll get some but not the way they did it and especially if its triathlon and sports like that. If it’s the baseball team or the NBA it’s going to be a different story,” he said.
Sakovich has been on Saipan since early March and will stay until late April to help with, among others, the Tagaman Triathlon and Saipan XTERRA Championship. His wife Jean, a Hall of Fame inductee herself, is set to join him this week.
