2/21/2016: And you thought those $400K campaign contributions Kitzhaber got smelled bad? ESPN has the latest here:
… Sunday Times sportswriter David Walsh, renowned for his coverage of cycling champion Lance Armstrong’s doping, reported that Nikita Kamaev wrote to him in November offering to reveal information on doping covering the past three decades since Kamaev began work for a “secret lab” in the Soviet Union.
Ramil Khabriev, Kamaev’s former boss at RUSADA, told Russia’s Tass agency that Kamaev planned to write a book but abandoned it because an “American publisher” had demanded too much influence over its contents.
Kamaev died Feb. 14 at age 52 of what RUSADA called a massive heart attack.
In Walsh’s account, Kamaev was quick to contact The Sunday Times after a World Anti-Doping Agency commission accused RUSADA of helping to cover up doping by top Russian athletes as part of a systematic, state-sponsored program of drug use.
According to the newspaper, Kamaev said he had collected unpublished “documents, including confidential sources, regarding the development of performance enhancing drugs and medicine in sport” plus communications with the Russian Sports Ministry and International Olympic Committee. It is not clear whether Kamaev ever provided any documents. …
2/19/2016: Everyone will get a cut of IAAF hotel tax pork – except UO’s academic side
The RG’s Saul Hubbard has more here:
SALEM — Backers of an increase in Oregon’s hotel-room tax have slightly scaled back and tweaked their request, to win support from hesitant lawmakers in the state House.
The tax increase is being sought, in part, to generate money for a $25 million subsidy request for the 2021 World Track and Field Championships in Eugene.
The House was scheduled to vote on the bill, HB 4146, on Friday. But instead the bill was sent back to committee for changes, after it became clear that there weren’t enough votes in the chamber to pass it.
There’s been little outright opposition among interest groups or lawmakers to helping pay for the Eugene track championships, which will cost far more to stage than they can bring in in ticket and other marketplace revenue.
But Portland-area government agencies are lobbying hard for a smaller increase in the state lodging tax, to leave themselves room to increase their own local hotel tax. Other regions meanwhile are seeking a bigger share of the proposed new statewide tax revenue. …
2/15/2016: Oregon Legislature can’t decide how many millions in tax money to give corrupt IAAF and Track Town’s $850K Lananna
The House Revenue Committee amends Rep. Nancy Nathanson’s IAAF/Track Town subsidy bill with some minor qualifications, and then sends it on to the House floor, on a close vote. Presumably they’ll figure out how to spread the Hotel Tax pork around enough to get this passed.
Here’s hoping Lord Seb Coe’s IAAF can keep any more news about soliciting bribes from Putin’s friends to cover up doping by Russian athletes or using brown envelopes and Rolexes to decide who gets the IAAF championships out of the papers for a week or two. Speaking of which, a second figure in Russian scandal has just died unexpectedly. The Guardian has more here.
Meanwhile the UO Board meets on Thursday to vote on using eminent domain to prepare the way for rebuilding Hayward Field in the style to which the Duck Athletics Department has become accustomed. And UO’s Public Records Office is still sitting on many requests for documents about the deal, including this one from the BBC, back on December 2:
Requester: McKay, Calum
Organization: BBC
Initial Request Date: 12/02/2015
Status: Requesting/Reviewing Records
1) All records used, generated, sent or received by the following people: University of Oregon Associate Athletics Director, University of Oregon Associate Vice President for State and Community Affairs, and CEO of the University of Oregon Foundation.
Including but not limited to emails, letters, reports, text messages, records of meetings and other communications, which match the following search terms: Nike, Coe, Seb, TrackTown, Track Town, TTUSA, IAAF, 2021, Masback, Capriotti, Fasulo, Lamine, Diack, CSM, Jackie AND Brock AND/OR Doyle
2) All records used, generated, sent or received by the following people: University of Oregon Athletics Director, University of Oregon Board Chairman, former University of Oregon Interim President, current University of Oregon President and University of Oregon Associate Director of Events Administration Athletics.
Including, but not limited to emails, letters, reports, text messages, records of meetings and other communications, which match the following search terms: Nike, Coe, Seb, TrackTown, Track Town, TTUSA, IAAF, 2021, Masback, Capriotti, Fasulo, Lamine, Diack, Vin, Lananna, CSM, Jackie AND Brock AND/OR Doyle
The period of this request covers from 18 November 2014 until the present.
2/11/2016: They’ll figure it out today at 1PM: https://olis.leg.state.or.us/liz/2016R1/Committees/HREV/2016-02-11-13-00/Agenda
Saul Hubbard has more on the logrolling, here: