Spires of the Mormon Temple rise next to a downtown Salt Lake City office building that has been wrapped in a poster promoting the Olympics. The Games, which the city spent millions to acquire, ended Sunday.Posted on 02/25/2002 1:47:13 PM PST by Utah Girl
Spires of the Mormon Temple rise next to a downtown Salt Lake City office building that has been wrapped in a poster promoting the Olympics. The Games, which the city spent millions to acquire, ended Sunday.For nearly three weeks, downtown streets here, normally deserted after 6 p.m., were crowded well into the night. Store signs spoke in a rainbow of languages. Public squares were filled with exhibitions and entertainment.
The Winter Olympics, a jewel that cities spend millions to acquire, transformed Salt Lake City, bringing it a rich diversity of culture and languages to lift it into the league of cosmopolitan centers. Downtown felt more like New York or Paris than Salt Lake's poky old self.
"I've never seen Salt Lake City quite like this," Brian Challis, an artist from a Salt Lake suburb said the other day, marveling at the throngs walking the streets. A ticket scalper from Manchester, England, who gave his name only as Simon, stood on a busy corner and said, "Seems like this is America's hidden secret, doesn't it?"
But is it, really? What happens now? What happens with the show moving on, visitors leaving and traditional issues, like Utah's $200 million budget deficit, nudging their way back into view and the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, which agreed to a muted role during the Olympics, moving back to the forefront of daily life?
During seven years of planning, state and local leaders looked longingly into their Olympic future, half promising, half hoping that Salt Lake's 17 days with destiny would change forever the profile of a city known best as the Mormon capital of the world and of a state known widely for its staggering conservatism and homogeneity, owing to the influence of the church.
Yet it remains far from clear to what degree, if any, those enduring aspirations might be achieved.
Some buds of change are evident. New roads, light-rail lines and hotels reflect part of the $4 billion in construction that preceded the Olympics. Gov. Michael O. Leavitt, a Republican who predicted the Games would bring new businesses to the state, spent much of the last two weeks squiring around venture capitalists, promoting Utahans' work ethic and high educational level.
Utah ski resorts, which have often played second fiddle to those in Colorado, have now been seen by a television audience of several billion, an almost certain boon for local tourism. Tourism officials say the competition sites built for the Olympics, like the luge and bobsled runs, could turn Utah into a winter sports center.
"This is a launch, not a landing," said Mr. Leavitt, assessing the effect of the Olympics on the region.
But all that reflects a potential economic effect of the Olympics, which concluded tonight. Harder to predict is whether they might serve as a sociological crowbar, opening Utah to new ideas through culture and political shifts.
As one of the fastest-growing states, with a population of 2.2 million, Utah remains fiercely Republican. Its only Democrat among three members of Congress, Representative Jim Matheson of Salt Lake City, was the bull's-eye of a redistricting plan that diluted his concentration of Democrats to make him vulnerable to a Republican challenger this year. The Utah Legislature is overwhelmingly Republican, as are almost all judges and county officials.
Most of them are Mormon, reflecting a church to which 70 percent of state residents belong. In addition, almost 90 percent of state residents are white.
As a result, any change that would dent majorities is viewed with a high degree of apprehension. Chic and diverse, such as they are in Utah, play well only here in Salt Lake City, where just fewer than half the 181,000 residents are Mormons, where voters have elected a Democrat as mayor, Ross C. Anderson, and where the populations of minorities like blacks, Hispanics, Asians, gays and lesbians are growing.
Some experts predict that by drawing in tens of thousands of outsiders, the Olympics will transform Salt Lake City and Utah.
"The Olympics are now part of the state's history, and they are going to have an impact," said Theresa Martinez, a professor of sociology at the University of Utah. "Whether the L.D.S. church wants it or not, they will lead to a new openness and consideration of the more liberal side of things."
Still, evidence suggests that even in the state's largest city, change comes only grudgingly. At the downtown Nordstrom department store here, racks upon racks of women's designer shoes were displayed with great prominence these last few weeks, but their shelf life was short.
"They were brought in just for the Olympics," a sales clerk said last week. "On Monday, they all go back to the West Coast."
Some economic signs are not encouraging, despite the nightly crowds. Mr. Challis said sadly that the gallery on Main Street that he has been sharing with other artists for the Olympics is scheduled to return on Monday to its former self, an unoccupied storefront. Business owners outside the downtown ring complained steadily that they accrued little benefit from so many visitors to the city.
Only time will reveal which snapshot of the last few weeks might foretell the future of the city and state. Taking the bright side, Ms. Martinez suggested looking at Utah like "a dull, awkward child" suddenly energized and polished by the possibilities of life.
"The liberal elements have always been here," she said. "That's going to receive new fuel and strength from all this, and I think the L.D.S. church will be transformed, as well."
As for residents of the state, she was less certain the Olympics would alter their politics. Noting that so many visitors had a good time in a safe and festive atmosphere, she said the locals might take that as a positive reflection of themselves.
People here, she said, "want to be accepted, it goes so deep. I'm sure they are feeling, `Wow, aren't we proud?' and maybe now they have a sense that other people might like them, after all."
If a state is predominantly conservative, why then of course, we must be sociologically backwards. And of course, as a result we fear any change. Well, we fear change that brings the problems that the big cities such as NYC has. We're not going to compromise our principles just so that the NY Times loves us.
And I take it as high praise indeed, that the only chic and diverse people live in SLC. The rest of us Utahns are redneck hicks...And the Nordstrom store is a test site for shoes for all Nordstroms, so the shoes were probably going back anyway. Yup, Nordstroms makes us wear clunky, unfashinable shoes...
And I have to laugh. The leaders of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints suggested in 1997 that the members need to be politically diverse, that some of us should be Democrats. Right after their comments, the Monica Lewinsky scandal broke, and hmmm, nothing has been said since. Utah has a proud history of having many Democrats in office, it is the Democrat party that has moved, not Utah.
And this crack New York Times reporter failed to recognize the building in the photo with the ice skater on it is the Church Office Building, which is owned by...the LDS church.
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Man. Well, I wouldn't want to live there apparently, but you guys have fun :)
Seems like it starts with an "M".
Michael
Well, maybe someday it can be as diverse as progressive Oregon (83.5%). But of course, those conservative Mormons will never be as diverse as Kennedy's Massachusetts (81.9%) or Rhode Island (81.9%). That 3.4% difference is just too vast.
Worse, Gore's Tennessee (79.2%)and hip Washington (78.9%) are beyond reach with their overwhelming 6.1% and 6.4% leads. How do the people in Utah live in such a terrible close-minded world?
By the way, the US number is 69.1%.
Towards the right middle, just pick a state. From the state options, just go down to Demographic Profiles and choose Table DP-1. At the top right hand column, under the Hispanic or Latino and Race category, there's a line for White Alone. Of course, the info can probably be found in a number of other places since the Census is churning out all sorts of Tables and Charts.
On my visits to Utah, I have found the people to be nothing but warm and friendly, the scenery beautiful, and the crime to be low...
No mattter where one lives, there are pluses and minuses...better to concentrate on the pluses, than crab about the minuses...
But after everyone has left, what has really changed? How many St. Lake residents are ever going to try out the bobsled run or ski jump?
Nothing is going to change. It didn't change any previous city. Heck, if anything, it was bad luck for Sarajevo. They became ground central in a civil war.
St. Lake City isn't going to have any permanent change as a result of this. And that's a good thing, because the people there like it the way it is.
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