The Orlando Business Journal announced Monday, February 11 that the Orlando bid for the 2018 Gay Games is still alive and heading forward. Back in August, 2012 Orlando was announced as one of the five finalists and the only finalist not in Europe. The games will bring in over 12,000 attendees and 200,000 guests.
If that wasn't enough to convince you that Orlando still has a chance at these games that are expected to bring a $100 Million economic impact on its host city we are the first American city to gain some pretty big support. The 2014 host city will be Cleveland, Ohio but the Orlando 2018 bid is the first to happen with Barack Obama as President (the Cleveland bid happened before his presidency with a November, 2009 announcement of the win). This gives Orlando the exciting honor of being the first city in U.S. history to gain the endorsement of the President.
2018 will be the Gay Games X and will be the first to offer a number of new sports including Roller Derby. The 2014 games in Cleveland will be the first to offer a Rodeo while all American cities that have hosted the games since 1994 have offered flag football.
The Orlando Business Journal article also points out that Orlando is already familiar with large GBLT events as we already host Gay Days each June. The host city announcement will be made in October, 2013. As a sports mecca already it'd be great to see this amazing sporting event a part of our great city.
