The U.S. Olympic Committee trimmed its list of candidates for a potential 2024 Olympic bid on Tuesday but did not disclose which cities were chosen.
The USOC will probably make a public announcement in the next 10 days, after taking the next few days to communicate with the smaller group of cities individually.
“We’re not prepared to get into any specifics or details today, other than to say we had a great discussion, and we’re going to be moving forward with some really fantastic candidates,” USOC chairman Larry Probst said after a board of directors meeting in Boston, one of the cities that has expressed interest in bidding for 2024.
The other cities reported to be in the running were Dallas, Los Angeles, San Diego, San Francisco and Washington. In May, Probst said the short list would probably be two or three cities.
The 2024 process, which began with the USOC sending letters to 35 mayors in February 2013, has been kept private to encourage participation from the cities, USOC CEO Scott Blackmun said.
“What we’re trying to do is create an opportunity to have open, meaningful conversations with these cities in a context where they don’t have to be public,” Blackmun said. “I don’t think any of the cities that we’re going to be talking to in the next six months have made unequivocal decisions that they want to stay in [2024 bidding].”
The U.S. has not hosted an Olympics since the 2002 Winter Games and is in the midst of its largest gap between hosting since the 28-year stretch between 1932 and 1960.
The U.S. has not committed to a bid for 2024 yet, and it said it will not decide until the outcome of Agenda 2020.
Agenda 2020, a blueprint introduced by IOC president Thomas Bach shortly after his election last year, includes the review of Olympic host city bidding procedures.
A finalized Agenda 2020 is expected to go up for IOC approval in December. The USOC has said it hopes to decide if it will bid, and, if it does, which city, by the end of this year.
“We clearly want to see the output from that [Agenda 2020] working group and what changes are adopted before we push the go button on formalizing a bid on 2024,” Probst said.
The next steps for a USOC bid team will be to perform what Blackmun called “deeper due diligence” on the short list of cities. The USOC wants to make sure each city can deliver Games essentials and big-ticket items such as an Olympic Stadium, Olympic Village and media centers.
The bid team will visit the short list of cities and provide an update to the board of directors at a September meeting.
