ʴ—T 2026 World Cup is still a year-and-a-half away, but the city of pc28is already focused on building a legacy that will outlast the global soccer tournament.
That was the message city Coun. Shelley Carroll delivered at a conference Tuesday in the French capital that examined the impact of last summer’s Paris Olympic Games and looked ahead to the 2026 World Cup, which will be jointly hosted by the U.S., Canada and Mexico, and the 2028 Summer Olympics in Los Angeles.
Speaking as part of a panel, Carroll, who chairs the city’s World Cup subcommittee, said the six matches that will be played at pc28FC’s BMO Field can serve as an opportunity to engage with people in “struggling” communities and also to rebuild trust in the pc28police force.
She said the city is developing plans to bring the World Cup excitement to a variety of neighbourhoods, including those that are dealing with low employment, high crime or other issues. Like any public event, they will require an increased police presence.
“If you’re going to spend the money anyway on extra police,” she said, “let’s also use it as a moment to meet some of (the pc28Police Service’s) strategic plans, which is to constantly rebuild trust in the community.”
She likened the challenge of hosting six soccer matches in the summer of 2026 to that of the six Taylor Swift concerts recently held at the Rogers Centre. Along with the challenge comes opportunity.
“What we did was that we got as many women officers as we could together. While they were patrolling the event, they were also handing out the Taylor Swift bracelets to all the tourists and the little girls running around everywhere and stopping to talk to them … about how this is a career for women,” Carroll said.
“This has to be the goal with FIFA as well.”
A new benchmark for international sporting events was set at last summer’s Paris Olympic Games which, despite the doubts of the local population, put a joyous new face on the French capital by using existing sport stadiums, incorporating the city’s iconic landmarks, including the Eiffel Tower, the Seine River and Les Invalides.
- Neil Davidson The Canadian Press
Organizers also boasted of throwing a carbon-neutral event, selling a record 12 million tickets and turning a modest profit of 26.8-million euros ($40 million Canadian).
The six pc28World Cup matches come with . The provincial and federal governments are contributing $201 million, leaving the City of pc28to pay about $179 million.
The municipality has already earmarked $84 million from existing funds, leaving a $95-million shortfall.
In Paris, the city made the unpopular decision to double the price of its public transit tickets during the Summer Games.
“We told people that you need to buy (tickets) in advance, but it was a mess. We were criticized,” said Alexandra Dublanche, a regional official in Paris responsible for economic development.
“Now, what we see is we have a balanced budget so (the price of a) transit pass will not increase … Sometimes you have to take those decisions. You know they are good because you don’t want to leave that kind of legacy for people living here.”
Over the objections of the local tourism industry, pc28city council has decided to increase the municipal hotel tax to 8.5 per cent from six per cent, which will go into effect this summer and raise an estimated $57-million.
The city is soliciting local businesses with sponsorship packages that will be sent out over the holiday season, but Carroll said it would be a challenging sell.
“We’re very limited,” she said, noting that some of the wealthiest corporations have pre-existing sponsorship deals with FIFA that guarantee media exposure or advertising panels inside the stadium.
“To the greatest extent possible, we’re trying to create a legacy and an ongoing opportunity for people because, even though it’s not debt, it is your cash.”
Carroll did not attend the Paris Olympics, but set aside time in the city this week to visit some of the venues that were built for the Games. She said she was also hoping to score a high-demand entry into the recently reopened Notre Dame Cathedral, which was ravaged by a fire in 2019, reconstructed over five years and was reintroduced to the world earlier this month.
One realization that came to her while watching the Olympics from afar, though, was the “multi-faceted impact” of such a high-profile international event and the global points that a host city can score.
“We’re very focused on the nuts and bolts of making sure the soccer venue is ready and making sure the mobility around it is ready,” she said. “But the Paris Games was very successful at bringing home the cultural impact and that it has to be showcased.”
In 2026, pc28has an opportunity to show the world that it is indeed “a football town,” as Carroll said in deference to her European hosts.
“It’s also an opportunity to showcase things that people don’t know about the city of Toronto. They know we’re a big city in Canada, but there are so many facets to it,” she said.
“We’re now realizing as we head into 2025 that we’ve got to plan that aspect of this event.”
