Toronto has won the 2015 Pan Am Games, on the first ballot.
The victory was announced at a city-run party on Toronto’s waterfront just after 4:30 p.m. "It’s amazing," said Deputy Premier George Smitherman. "A decisive first-ballot victory."
The announcement came after 42 delegates from the Pan American Sports Organization pondered the final presentations from Toronto and the other contenders – Bogota, Colombia, and Lima, Peru.
A total of 52 ballots were cast, since past host cities get to vote twice.
Bob Richardson, a senior advisor to the Toronto bid, said committee members were confident heading into Friday’s vote.
"You never know how these things are going to turn out. We feel that we’ve put our best foot forward and we’ve done all the things that we could do," he said.
The news must come as a relief for some in Toronto – a city that endured losing bids for the 1996 and 2008 Olympic Games and failed to get a campaign for an Expo fully off the ground.
With the win, the Toronto bid committee charged with securing the Games will be dissolved and a new committee in charge of staging the $1.4-billion event in 17 cities around the region will be struck.
The Games are also expected to create economic spinoffs – both in the 15,000 construction jobs that would be created to build Games infrastructure and from tourism generated from the anticipated 250,000 visitors.
However, not everyone is happy.
A coalition calling itself No Games Toronto argues the Games, and the para-Pan Am Games, will divert resources away from homelessness, tuition fees and social housing, and leave a legacy of crippling debt.
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