USOC shows positive results of cost-cutting

CHICAGO – The U.S. Olympic Committee’s cost-cutting measures are beginning to pay off.

The USOC will finish this year with a deficit, typical in a non-Olympic year. But expenses will be several million less than expected and will be erased by a $37 million projected surplus in next year’s budget.

“They’re running positively ahead of budget,” chairman Peter Ueberroth said Thursday after an executive board meeting. “The revenues are above projections, the expenses are below, and that’s attributable to management.”

Expenses are generally higher than revenues in non-Olympic years, when the USOC is spending to get athletes ready for the upcoming games but isn’t getting the big money that comes from the Olympic TV contracts. In 2005, for example, the USOC has budgeted $97 million in revenues and $120 million in expenses, although the expenses are expected to be lower by roughly $3 million.

The USOC’s 2006 budget, passed two weeks ago, projects revenues of $172 million and expenses of $135 million – a $37 million surplus.