It's official: Sudbury will submit bid for 2021 Summer Games

As of January 31, Sudbury will officially be in the running for host city of the 2021 Canada summer games.

City council approved the official bid package after two hours of debate last night. The bid, accompanied by a non-refundable payment of $10,000, will be submitted by the end of January.

• City of Greater Sudbury wants public to back 2021 Canada Games bid

But not all councillors want the games to come to Sudbury, suggesting the millions of dollars could be put toward things like lowering the unemployment rate.

"I would love to see the games. I think all the benefits are there," said councillor Robert Kirwan, "but I have to take a look at our responsibility for the money. And as long as we're willing to accept that we might be committing this city to $20-30 million out of our reserve funds, fine."

Councillor Mark Signoretti said that even with the financial burden the games impose —  including $3 million in cash for capital expenditures —  the games are a risk worth gambling on.

"We can sit here and do status quo and when some opportunity is presented to us and not act on it," Signoretti said, "or we can be bold and take calculated risks that are going to benefit just not our generation, but our kids' generation and their kids' generation."

Sudbury is up against Kitchener-Waterloo, Ottawa and the Niagara Region to land the two-week, multi-sport event.

Guelph, originally packaged with Kitchener-Waterloo to host the event, has already backed out of the bid process due to a lack of capital funds.

The host city will be announced at the end of March.