[AGA-mcm] convention update

[Erik Olson <erik@thekrib.com>]

Just got off the phone with Jim from SFBAAPS who was on vacation last 
weekend:

"The club is very healthy.  Great turnout last couple meetings, especially 
new people.  Michael Skidmore helping to explain what SFBAAPS and AGA are, 
as most aren't aware of this.  We've got 50 paid members now.  Clearly 
people want some kind of organization.

As I was out last few weeks, tried to solicit some help from the team for 
hotel search, no response.  Decided to do it myself this weekend; asked 
four guys to come with, and one has responded so far (Michael LaFlamme).

Three hotels in Oakland on the field trip: Park Plaza, Jack London Inn, 
and Downtown Marriott (connected with convention center).  All have 
websites, have quoted us rates in our range.  Dave Gomberg thinks we can 
get Park Plaza for $95.  Don't know facility rental rates yet, but will 
get details on the trip.  We will try to do this this weekend.  Will let 
you know as soon as we know.

We were really let down the higher-priced hotels path earlier, and it's 
possible we'd ruled out some of the SF hotels that were probably OK."

Michael, since you're on this list, maybe you could impress upon others in 
SFBAAPS how time-critical and important these first few steps are. This is 
a delimma for us.  We really want this to come together, and we really 
want to help make it happen.  But at a certain point, we have to decide 
if it's not moving fast enough to happen, and change our strategy.  We are 
on that fence right now as we head into mid-October.

Perhaps the AGA has been giving the wrong impression about how these 
conventions are planned, i.e., local club goes and does all the research, 
puts together a bid, submits bid where AGA board sees it for the first 
time and gives a thumbs-up or thumbs-down.  In reality these things are 
created before the bid is completed, with people from both clubs talking, 
sharing experience, making suggestions, helping with negotiations, etc. 
By the time the bid has been written out, it's well-known what the 
convention entails.

  - Erik

--
Erik Olson
erik at thekrib dot com
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