Political Event Planning: Do Convention Host Cities Benefit?

In case you haven't noticed, we are in full campaign season as we approach the presidential elections in November. And, as part of that process, the event planners are busy organizing each party's respective convention. The conventions are a great vehicle and opportunity to showcase the party's platform and, of course, the star performer - the candidate. While many of us are probably very well aware of who those candidates are, they are officially unveiled at their conventions. The Republicans will be first up with their convention taking place in Tampa week of August 27th. Next up will be the Democrats with their convention in Charlotte the week of September 3rd.

Political Event Planning Has a Very Strong Focus on Security
With political parties, in addition to the program itself, the event planning is heavily focused on security. After all, for presidential elections, one of the candidate is the current sitting president. No doubt there will be protesters at both the Democrat and the Republican conventions. That's just something that goes with the territory. However, with protesting, there is always a security concern. A lot of the money that is allocated by the federal government and the local municipalities has to be spent towards ensuring that all of the delegates, and especially both of the candidates, are well protected.

The Pros and Cons of Hosting a Political Convention
Obviously each of the cities that bid to host these political conventions think that the benefits far outweigh the hassles. After all, we are still stuck in the middle of one of the worst economic downturns in our lifetime. But, there are definitely some issues that need to be addressed in the planning stages.

Political Event Planning-the Cons
Security. Not only from a cost perspective but from a coordination aspect as well. After all, because of the delegates involved, there needs to be coordination at the municipal, state and federal levels as well as with the Secret Service. And just trying to determine the hierarchy (save for the Secret Service) can be a logistical nightmare. And with both Florida and North Carolina having concealed weapons laws (which allow their citizens to carry concealed weapons with the permits) this presents a security nightmare, to say the least.

The City's Image. With protesters often comes damage and destruction. Tourism officials are always concerned when images are published in the press that show their respective cities in a negative light. Not that anyone will be blaming the municipalities themselves for any demonstrations that occurred during the conventions. But we are humans after all and when we go to book our vacations those images may pop into our minds and have an effect on whether or not we decide to visit those cities.

Political Event Planning-the Pros
Infrastructure. As cities prepare to host the conventions they all want to make sure that everything is spruced up and looking great for everyone arriving. And their cities are also on the national stage from the media's perspective as well. So the cities are currently receiving a lot of attention to their infrastructures. Pretty safe to say that a lot of this work would not be completed by these municipalities except for the fact that they are hosting these conventions.

Revenues. Congress allocates $50 million to each host city to help them prepare for the big events. Now, admittedly, most of that will go toward security for the conventions. But, if history is any indication, Tampa and Charlotte both stand to see between $150 to $170 million pumped into the local economies. Certainly nothing to sneeze at given the current economy.

Tourism. According to Hotel News Now, current hotel occupancy rates in Tampa are 69.5% and 63.1% in Charlotte. Confirmed bookings indicate that during the convention Tampa is expected to have a hotel occupancy rate of 82.7% and Charlotte is expected to see an occupancy of 88.4%.

From all indications, there will be some PR issues that Tampa and Charlotte will be dealing with. City officials recognize that there will be logistical issues that need to be dealt with, namely transportation and security. But, factoring both the pros and the cons, CVB (Convention and Visitors Bureau ) officials in both cities are considering the conventions to be a win-win for the local economy.