A city councillor is calling on his colleagues to agree to spend up to $100,000 to bring the 2010 Olympic torch relay to Winnipeg.

Coun. Grant Nordman says the Olympic organizing committee has asked Winnipeg to host events as the torch makes its way across Canada to Vancouver for the Winter Games.

"They would like Winnipeg to be among the capital cities across the provinces that hosts an Olympic torch run," he said.

Nordman asked city council at Wednesday's meeting to agree to spend up to $100,000 to support a "civic celebration" related to the torch's arrival in Winnipeg in January 2010.

Council referred the request to the executive policy committee, the mayor's cabinet.

Nordman hopes the city makes a decision soon, because Olympic organizers are only weeks from announcing the route for the torch relay.

He fondly recalled a previous torch relay: "In 1988, our mayor and myself were in our mid-30s. Coun. [Jeff] Browaty was in Grade 6. So there's a generation that's never had an opportunity to see an Olympic torch run in our city."

The official lighting of the Olympic flame will take place in 2009 in Greece. It will travel 35,000 kilometres over 100 days in Canada.