The head of the organization spearheading the America’s Cup in San Francisco said that they will support the deal that the office of Mayor Edwin M. Lee submitted to the Board in March, which was approved unanimously.
Jon Miller, President of Programming at the NBC Sports Group with Richard Worth, Chairman, America’s Cup Event Authority. The NBC Sports Group will present live coverage of the 34th America’s Cup on both NBC and the NBC Sports Network. ©2012 ACEA
BC STAFF REPORT
Published: April, 2012
The head of the organization spearheading the America’s Cup in San Francisco said that they will support the deal that the office of Mayor Edwin M. Lee submitted to the Board in March, which was approved unanimously. This finalizes the path for the City of San Francisco to host the world’s most prestigious sailing event, the America’s Cup, in San Francisco during the summer of 2013. An official statement released by the America’s Cup Event Authority (ACEA) said, "It’s an arrangement we can live with, but not what we expected."
"We have worked very hard to bring this historic race to San Francisco and we’re glad we have reached an agreement with the City," said Stephen Barclay, a director of the America’s Cup Event Authority. "While we support the deal submitted to the Board, it is not what we had anticipated or planned for."
Barclay said the new deal falls short on several key provisions that were "anticipated to be included and the absence of these provisions will have a negative impact on the financial outcome of the event. "While far from ideal, we’re just pleased to be done so we can move away from deal points and start focusing on the races and the competition between the teams, which is what the Louis Vuitton Cup and America’s Cup is all about."
The new deal calls for the ACEA to spend more and be reimbursed less. The deal also re-instates Piers 30/32 as the location for the America’s Cup Team Bases, giving the race a central area for the teams and a "pit row" for spectators. Renovations to Piers 30/32 were removed from a previous plan that Mayor Lee was considering and would have forced Team Bases to be located at Pier 80. The fan access to Team Bases on Piers 30/32, combined with the America’s Cup Village at Piers 27/29 and the natural sailing amphitheater of the Bay will make the event’s footprint more compact and will benefit the teams as well as the general public.
Shortly after these changes were introduced, ACEA, the commercial arm of the sport, announced that they will lead to organizational changes and staff reductions at the Event Authority due in part to downsizing of the event footprint in San Francisco. The reductions impacted 14 in San Francisco and another 14 staff at other offices around the world that were laid off.
"These individuals have been valued members of our team since the start of the Event Authority and have made many valuable contributions to our organization, and we wish them all of the best in their future endeavors," said Barclay. He said severance packages were in place for the departing employees when they were informed of the staff reductions.
"We must ensure that our expenses match revenues. We made these changes to create efficiencies necessary to ensure that we deliver an exciting and important event for both the world of competitive sailing and San Francisco," Barclay added.
He said the America’s Cup Event Authority was pleased it had reached a new agreement with the City of San Francisco. The financial package is "not what we had anticipated or planned for but we are moving forward because this sailing event will be fantastic for the teams, sailors around the world and all San Francisco."
Racing is set to kick off this year with the America’s Cup World Series events, the first of which will be in Naples, Italy April 11-15 followed by events in Venice, Italy (May) and Newport, Rhode Island (June).
Coming to you live
For those not able to view the race in person, this Cup sees the return to live national television, with NBC Sports Group to broadcast over-the-air in the U.S. for the first time in more than 20 years.
"The broadcast interest is a reflection of the exciting venue, technological advancements of the boats, and, most importantly technological advances in cinematography that capture this race like never before," said Barclay.
Live from New York, it’s…
…not going to be the America’s Cup! On the heels of the NBC deal, several news organizations reported that ACEA was back in New York City shopping one of the World Series races originally scheduled for this August in San Francisco. This was confirmed by posts on the official website for America’s Cup saying that the event in August would occur in San Francisco or New York but adding another World Series event in San Francisco in October.
Barclay was quoted as saying, "Having these things race around the Statue of Liberty would engage the East Coast." However, he also mentioned that New York had already passed when previously approached with the idea. Apparently not much has changed, because the idea has been dropped and now www.americascup.com has both the August (21-26) and October (4-7) World Series events scheduled for San Francisco.
"We are thrilled that, in addition to the Louis Vuitton Cup and the America’s Cup racing in 2013, that the America’s Cup World Series will also take place in San Francisco in 2012," said Mayor Edwin Lee. "This will add even more visitors, jobs and economic development as part of hosting one of the world’s premier sporting events."
We’ve been told that the 34th America’s Cup is expected to generate over a billion dollars in economic benefits for San Francisco during the next two years and will draw millions of fans and spectators and more than 1,000 accredited news media for the races. However, with the recent changes to the agreement with the City of San Francisco and reports of less-than-expected turnouts at some of the World Series venues, some are beginning to question whether the whole event has been overhyped.
