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Following two consecutive and unsuccessful bids for the Winter Olympics by Anchorage, Alaska, the United States Olympic Committee (USOC) opened up the bidding process to other United States cities on November 12, 1988 at a meeting in Minneapolis, Minnesota. Representatives from Salt Lake City were present at the meeting, and had mentioned the city would likely enter the competition for the right to represent the United States in the international bid for the 1998 Winter Olympics. On November 14, 1988—two days following the USOC's announcement—Salt Lake Mayor Palmer DePaulis officially announced the city's candidacy. Salt Lake had already attempted to secure the right to represent the United States in 1985, but had lost out to Anchorage. During that process the Salt Lake Winter Games Organizing Committee had been organized. Following the announcement by Mayor DePaulis the committee was reorganized and held its first meeting December 2, 1988. Initially the city and committee worked closely with Better Utah Incorporated, a private sports promotion agency helping to push the Olympic bid.

The USOC's Site Selection Committee visited the Salt Lake City area the end of April 1989 to visit possible venue sites and discuss Salt Lake's bid with its leaders. In May 1989 the USOC officially invited three cities (Salt Lake, Anchorage, Denver, Colorado, and the Reno-Lake Tahoe, Nevada area) to place their bids; two other cities, Klamath Falls, Oregon and Lake Placid, New York, had shown interest in hosing the games but, had dropped out earlier in the bidding process.

The USOC announced on June 4, 1989 in Des Moines, Iowa that Salt Lake had won its bid to represent the United States in bidding for the 1998 Winter Olympics, and if that was unsuccessful the 2002 Winter Olympics. As part of its bid Salt Lake was required to build a bobsled-luge run, ski jump and speed-skating rink within 18 months. In order to do this the Utah State Legislature passed a bill creating a state agency, controlled by a 15 member authority board, known as the Utah Sports Authority. The authority would be given 1/32 of a cent from the already-existing state and local sales taxes—from December 1990 to December 1999—to build the needed venues; Olympic funds and revenue would then be used to repay the state. On November 7, 1989 voters in Utah passed the Olympic referendum affirming their support for the Olympic bid, and diversion of taxes for construction of Olympic venues.

On June 15, 1991 during the 97th IOC Session in Birmingham, England, United Kingdom, Salt Lake City's bid was defeated; losing to Nagano, Japan by four votes. Following the unsuccessful bid for the 1998 games, the Salt Lake City Bid Committee began work on their bid for the 2002 games. Construction also commenced on the Utah Olympic Oval, and continued on the Utah Olympic Park, which had been under construction since May 1991.

Salt Lake City Bid Committee for the Olympic Winter Games

opening
The Opening Ceremony of the 2002 Winter Olympics was held on February 8, 2002 beginning at 7:00 pm MST (02:00 UTC, February 9). The ceremony was held at Rice-Eccles Olympic Stadium on the University of Utah campus in Salt Lake City, Utah, United States.

The event was officially opened by President of the United States, George W. Bush. An audience of 52,000 were in attendance at the venue, while 3.5 billion viewers witnessed the ceremony on television. It was produced by Don Mischer, and his team. The music was directed by Mark Watters. There were an estimated ? performers.

Production
It was produced by Don Mischer,

The cast of made up of 4,000 performers, 98% of whom were Utahns.