[Lnc-business] Meeting costs

Mon Aug 4 13:35:27 EDT 2014

One option I was weighing when I told Guy to hold off was, the gentleman I mentioned that owns the parking garages…He has quite a few buildings attached to those parking garages..many of which have open offices.  I thought of approaching him about using some of his offices as flex space.  The problem there he has many of those properties up for lease and as the new year rolls around, new leases will roll in.  So it might seem like no problem, he might say YES to letting us use the space for very little or even..dare I say it..Free..the problem is we need to have definite plans. And maybes don’t work..and he surely can’t be expected to keep a space unleaded cause he said we could use it.. Then we would have to cart in chairs..etc…insure electricity…suitable equipment..what about internet? Then there was the reason Guy suggested the meeting here..so we could evaluate a hotel for a future convention. When I was told that we always stay in the hotel that the convention is in, it made it clear we needed to stay in one of the top contenders while we are here.
Here in La we have grown from one of the smallest state parties to a rather robust one in a little over 2 years.  We did that by hiring a professional that worked like a spartan for literal slave wages relative to the 90 or so hours a week she put in.  She held meetings in restaurants for free. We did the same with our quarterly meetings etc. Some spaces worked better than others, at times it was hard to hear.  And when if you want a space 2 days in a row for 8 hours a day…that tends to not work in ANY restaurant for free. Noisy crowds, delayed access waiting on previous parties,screaming babies…and any number of things make that not the most desirous option. As I am a donor and definitely not rich, how the money gets spent matters to me.  In Louisiana we do often skimp in areas like this because we are busy keeping our full time staffer that does a job for a fraction of what she should be getting paid. Even still we are looking at renting meeting spaces as we did for our last quarterly meeting as its rather difficult to get space for 50 people at a restaurant for free.  That said…we have that active of an affiliate here. Expect there to be people from all over the state in attendance at the LNC meeting. A suite definitely won’t work. You could barely fit all 18 in uncomfortably..and that’s 500-1000 for the weekend for being poorly accommodated. There are still costs of flying in, housing and feeding staff etc.  if you want to save money then leave staff at home? Don’t ship any materials here? those are a good chunk of the meeting expenses and really not practical when you get down to it.

To think we might meet in a field for a meeting or especially for a convention is just silly.  RAIN?Cold? Heat? Pigeons?  I was sweating my tail off in  Columbus some of those days in the air conditioning.   Our conventions do get broadcast these days. IF we met in a field somewhere, do you really think Joe Average that is looking for something else to do with his vote is going to take us serious? Myopic thinking like this is why the party has existed for 40 years and had little success till now. Why would we take steps back in the eyes of voters? we have a record 6 or 7 candidates running for Federal Office this year in Louisiana. 

Senate candidate Brannon McMorris was on a major radio station this morning talking about the party.  I called in after he was on as a member of the JPEC, SCC and LNC. One of the things they talked to me about about was the wasted vote, the lack of money, etc. I feel I did a fair job of handling those objections.  Myself and others spend lots of time and effort to convince the media that we ARE serious and not a bunch of delusional fools. Talking realistically to people does a lot more to win them over than the whole “magic wand” approach. But for every step we take forward..we get knocked back by people talking silly unrealistic ideas like is getting spewed here about meeting in fields. You want to act like good stewards of people’s money, well the best way to do that is to give them value, not half baked ideas that appeal to certain vocal fringes. If you wanna get rained on and muddy…come to NOLA for jazz fest..if you want to look and be professional then meet in professional spaces.
That said, I myself do wonder why we are not meeting at Headquarters. if that means we pay higher hotel room rates as LNC members..well we should bite that bullet. Though apparently I see that Wes says it would be way cramped so we will see for ourselves and do his 5 minute test run. I guess we shoulda done a better job designing the building for LNC meeting space…Oh well..cant unring that bell.
 To come to NOLA, a definite convention possibility and try and stay anywhere but a convention ready hotel is just ridiculous or you are saying New Orleans is NOT going to be considered for a convention.  We don’t get anything for our donations from Louisiana to National.  It would nice to at least be taken seriously. We don’t expect to get a convention just because a few of us from NOLA became life members at the last NatCon. We DO expect respect. We expect to be in the CONSIDERATION for a convention because this is one of the top convention and destination spots in the country. It would be good for the NATIONAL PARTY.  We specialize in conventions here. Attendance will be higher which means more money raised for ballot access that gets spent somewhere other than in Louisiana.  We have one of the fastest growing affiliates in the fastest growing party in the country.   Talk of staying in a field or outside of the convention zone in NOLA is a insult.  People from here don’t have a lot of confidence for how national gets run and as they see these conversations, their opinions drop even lower.
Many don’t seem to really care. That lack of attention to the details of office…including where we will be meeting and the sorts of impressions that you leave upon the people of New Orleans when you attend here is bothersome. I recruit people to the party everywhere I go. The sort of stuff that is being talked about here doesn’t come off as diligent stewardship, it comes off as cheap or silly. That effects me in how I am able to bring people over to the party. I expect you all to come here and look professional. If you can’t do that..then don’t come.

If we were having realistic conversations of using flex meeting space in cities where it is available as a cost saving measure, when we were not looking at that city for a future convention, that would be a good conversation. Though it seems all this stuff has been looked at before and when you get down to it, TANSTAAFL. But to be talking about having LNC meetings in barns and fields and restaurant coolers is just a lack of understanding of the marketing of this party. Members of hotel sales staff etc are looking at our party. You have to take into account the paradigm most people have.  If we want to be taken seriously we need to act serious.

Daniel Hayes
LNC Region 7 AR

On Aug 4, 2014, at 10:08 AM, Scott L. <scott73 at earthlink.net> wrote:

>  
> To do a thorough analysis of the advantages and disadvantages of meeting in hotels vs. other types of locations, one needs to take into account:
>  
> Convenience (how long it takes to commute from your sleeping quarters to the meeting site, and how long it takes to walk to and from lunch on Saturday, and maybe on Sunday)
>  
>  
> Ambience.  Despite comments from some of our members, the hotels at which the LNC holds its meetings are NOT luxury hotels. 
>  
>                  http://www.hotel-price-index.com/2014/spring/
>  
>  
> “The HPI was started in 2004 at 100 and includes all bookings across all star ratings from one-star to five-star. More than 150,000 properties around the world make up the sample set of hotels from which prices are taken.”
>  
>      The average price paid by travelers for all hotel bookings in the USA during 2013 was $131 per night.  Compare that to what the LNC will pay for our hotel rooms during the last 2 LNC Sessions of 2014.
>  
>  
>  
>  Do you really think that meeting in a barely large enough meeting room in a Denny’s or some other coffee shop is going to be conducive to holding a productive meeting?  Sometimes LNC members need to go to their hotel rooms in the middle of the day – how do you do that
>       if the meeting site is 3 miles from your hotel room?
>  
>  
> The problem isn’t the amount of our member’s money that we spend on Board meetings.  The problem is that after 42 years of existence we haven’t created a successful political party.  Because of that, we are still scrimping for every dollar.  That is why the amount of money we spend on board meetings seems “excessive.”
>  
> The answer to this “problem” is for us to encourage, cajole, and help our affiliates to elect many more Libertarians to public office, and for us to retain ballot status in 40 or more states on a semi-permanent basis;  not just in October of even numbered years.
>  
> If we do those two things, and we pay just an average amount of attention to fund raising, it won’t matter if the party spends $10,000 or $20,000 per year on Board Meetings. 
> 
>    Scott Lieberman
>  
>  
>  
> From: Lnc-business [mailto:lnc-business-bounces at hq.lp.org] On Behalf Of Joshua Katz
> Sent: Sunday, August 03, 2014 9:26 PM
> To: lnc-business at hq.lp.org
> Subject: [Lnc-business] Meeting costs
>  
> “Ron posted an excellent letter from Starchild on the costs of conventions.  I thought the $2500 I had heard was high.  As I said a few days ago, when I was corrected and found it was much higher, I was shocked.  
>  
> I do not want to meet in DC every meeting.  We should use the office we own when feasible, but it's just not fair to hold every meeting in the same location.  If LNC members want to bring a camper instead of staying in a hotel, that's fine, but irrelevant, since it has nothing to do with what the LP pays for our meetings.  But, really, $3000 for a room for 18 people to meet (or $2000 in food and beverage to get the room for 'free?')   I used to work at a school that weekly held meetings for 40 people.  I assure you we could not have rented out the room we used for $3000/weekend.  And we were on the beach!  
>  
> 18 people can meet in a park in nice weather.  18 people can meet, as I said before, in a suite.  18 people can meet in a coffee shop.  18 people do not need to pay $3000 for a room - and we wouldn't if it were our money.  We should be as careful, if not more so, with our donors money, as with our own.
>  
> Convention is one thing.  This is quite another, and is quite insane.  
> 
> Joshua A. Katz
>  
> Region 8 (Region of Badassdom) Alternate
> Libertarian National Committee
> 
> Chair, Libertarian Party of Connecticut”
> _______________________________________________
> Lnc-business mailing list
> Lnc-business at hq.lp.org
> http://hq.lp.org/mailman/listinfo/lnc-business_hq.lp.org

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://hq.lp.org/pipermail/lnc-business/attachments/20140804/efc72075/attachment-0002.html>