The proposed Brisbane bid for the 2028 Olympic Games "cleared another hurdle" Wednesday when the federal government did not flatly veto the idea, according to Wayne Smith of THE AUSTRALIAN. The Council of Mayors of southeast Queensland "voted in principle a fortnight ago to set up a pre-feasibility study to investigate a regional bid for the Olympics." But as 10 of the 12 mayors went into a meeting in Canberra Wednesday with PM Tony Abbott, Deputy PM Warren Truss and federal Sports Minister Sussan Ley "there was the very real fear the proposed bid might be stillborn if the government rejected it outright." Brisbane Lord Mayor Graham Quirk said, "No one slammed the door in our faces and that’s all we were asking for today. No one said to go away. Today was really a conversation opener." Arrangements also "are being made for Quirk and some of his fellow mayors" to meet IOC President Thomas Bach during his brief visit to Australia next month. And "by happy coincidence, one of the foremost authorities on bidding for and running an Olympic Games, London 2012 boss Sebastian Coe, was coming to Brisbane even before the city and its surrounding councils got interested in an Olympic bid." Quirk: "Obviously we will be picking his brain while he’s here" (THE AUSTRALIAN, 3/19).
