Los Angeles City Controller Kenneth Mejia is demanding that LA28 turn over financial records the private Olympic organizing committee is contractually required to provide to the city, after his office determined that LA28 has fully complied with only two of nine annual financial disclosure requirements.
The missing information includes bank statements, comparisons between financial forecasts and actual results, budgets and schedules for Olympic venues, and the identities of contractors along with the value and purpose of their contracts.
Those would be important records for any multibillion-dollar project. They are especially important here because LA28 may be privately operated, but Los Angeles taxpayers have agreed to cover its losses.
Under the 2017 Host City Contract, the city is ultimately responsible if the 2028 Olympic and Paralympic Games run a deficit. LA28 describes the Games as privately funded, with expected revenue from sponsorships, tickets, licensing, hospitality and the International Olympic Committee. But if those projections fall short, the public becomes the financial backstop.
When the city assumed that responsibility in 2017, the Olympic budget was $5.306 billion. It has since grown to $7.263 billion, according to the Controller’s Office, an increase of nearly 37 percent.
Each time projected expenses have increased, LA28 has raised its projected revenue by the same amount. That keeps the budget balanced on paper. Without the underlying forecasts, contracts and bank records, however, the public has little ability to determine whether those revenue assumptions are realistic or whether costs are being contained.
“The people of Los Angeles deserve full transparency from LA28 related to all spending and revenue incurred in the process of planning and executing the 2028 Olympic Games,” the Controller’s Office said in announcing the request Wednesday.
The 2021 Games Agreement requires LA28 to disclose nine categories of financial information every year. Mejia’s office found that six of those requirements have been only partially satisfied and that compliance with another could not be determined. Only two were complete.
The gaps prevent the Controller from seeing not only how much LA28 is spending, but where the money is going and what financial commitments have already been made. The request seeks, among other things, the names of contractors and the amounts and purposes of their contracts, venue-level budgets and schedules, bank statements, and comparisons showing whether LA28’s actual finances are tracking its projections.
The demand comes just two weeks after the City Council approved another agreement governing Olympic costs. On August 12, the Council voted 10-4 to approve the Enhanced City Resources Master Agreement, which establishes a process for LA28 to reimburse the city for services such as traffic control and street cleaning. Councilmembers Eunisses Hernandez, Ysabel Jurado, Nithya Raman and Monica Rodriguez voted no. Westside Councilmember Traci Park joined the majority in approving it.
The agreement gives the city access to a $270 million contingency fund if other sources do not cover its Olympic expenses. LA28 also has a separate $330 million internal contingency.
But those reserves do not eliminate the city’s exposure. If LA28 exhausts its contingency funds, Los Angeles would cover the next $270 million in losses. The state is expected to cover another $270 million, and the city’s General Fund would be responsible for anything beyond that. The General Fund is the same pool of money used for basic city services.
“There is nothing we could propose today or tomorrow or next year that would eliminate that risk,” City Administrative Officer Matt Szabo told the Council before the vote, according to the Los Angeles Times.
The city is also relying heavily on federal reimbursement for Olympic security, while some officials have warned that police and other public safety expenses could exceed $1 billion. How much federal funding Los Angeles will actually receive remains uncertain.
That makes the current arrangement markedly different from the 1984 Olympics, whose success is frequently cited to reassure Angelenos about 2028. In 1984, city leaders negotiated an exception that protected Los Angeles from responsibility for the organizing committee’s losses. This time, taxpayers are on the hook.
“We all want a successful 2028 Olympic Games, but its success cannot be at the cost of transparency and accountability to LA taxpayers,” Mejia said. “Any event of this size and cost requires rigorous financial scrutiny, and I intend to use my full authority under the City Charter to open up LA28’s books.”
The Controller’s announcement does not specify when LA28 must produce the records or what steps Mejia will take if the organization does not comply. But with less than two years remaining before the Games, the city is already entering contracts, planning services and taking on expenses based on a budget the public still cannot fully examine.