The City Council unanimously approved a 10-year lease renewal with Elite Athlete Services to manage the Chula Vista Elite Athlete Training Center on Tuesday, solidifying the city’s role in Olympic athlete development through 2028 and beyond. The agreement reestablishes Elite Athlete Services as th e day-to-day operator of the 155-acre campus, which serves approximately 1,000 meals daily to athletes and staff. Under the terms, the operator will receive an annual fee of $500,000 paid through facility revenues, plus a portion of net operating revenue. Remaining revenues will fund capital improvement projects. “In Paris at the Olympics in 2024, 92 medals were won. If we were our own country, we would be sixth in the world on the medal table,” said Brian Melekian, president and chief operating officer of Elite Athlete Services, during his presentation to the council. The facility, which opened in 1995 as the only master-planned Olympic training center in the United States, serves as home to U.S. Archery, Rugby, Paralympic Track and Field, Soccer and Rowing. It also functions as a training site for Team Canada ahead of the 2028 Los Angeles Olympics. Melekian said the center has set an internal goal of 100 medals for U.S. athletes training at the facility for the 2028 games, and the center has secured the right of first refusal to host the Olympic rowing trials in February 2028. The agreement includes a collaborative master planning process between the city and Elite Athlete Services to identify facility needs and development opportunities. The master plan will return to the City Council for adoption at a later date. After the vote, Mayor John McCann said he aimed to use the 10-year agreement and master planning process to elevate the training center “to the next level” and capitalize on the wave of international sporting events coming to North America over the next decade. “I want (the center) to be an opportunity for people to come from around the world and have competitive trials for the Olympics,” McCann said. “And by us being able to master plan it, it is going to give us even more leverage to bring athletes and sports opportunities to the training center.” ...read more read less