The International Olympic Committee (IOC) should undergo structural reforms "at all levels", a United States Olympic Committee (USOC) commission of inquiry into the Salt Lake City cash-for-votes scandal has reported.

Changes are necessary if the Olympic movement is to re-establish both its credibility and that the selection process for deciding host cities is fair, the USOC said in its report.

"If all the IOC top members and president (Juan Antonio) Samaranch resign now and nothing else is done, nothing will change," former Democrat senator George Mitchell, who presided over the commission of inquiry, told a press conference in New York.

"I hope that the IOC will take our report seriously at its meeting in Lausanne, Switzerland, on March 17th and 18th and will act upon it," Mitchell said on presenting his group's 56-page report.

Mitchell, one of the architects of the peace agreement in Northern Ireland, said he believed that the Salt Lake City scandal was a consequence of a "culture" that encouraged bidding cities to buy the votes of IOC members.

"But the responsibility for the scandal is at all levels, local, national and international," the report said.