Headlines of the Week

Recovery Signs Seen in Housing Market
The Oklahoman
http://tinyurl.com/mfjvnn

Foreign Trade Zones Offer Local Link to Global Business
The Oklahoman
July 22, 2009
http://tinyurl.com/lcm4mk

Report shows new convention center means more hotel rooms
Journal Record
July 22, 2009

OKLAHOMA CITY – If Oklahoma City is to have a new, larger convention center, it will also need a new, large hotel.
A report released Tuesday said that if a new convention center is proposed and meets voter approval, downtown’s 1,600 hotel rooms won’t be enough to meet demand.
The report, prepared by Conventions Sports and Leisure International for the Greater Oklahoma City Chamber, showed that if a 200,000-square-foot convention center is built, a 650-room convention hotel must be part of the plan.
“The area offers relatively few full-service, convention-quality hotel rooms when compared to competitive and comparable regional and national markets,” the report said.
Of the 13 comparable markets studied, Oklahoma City ranked near the bottom for hotel rooms within a half-mile of their convention centers.
John Williams, general manager of the Skirvin Hilton Hotel, said a new convention center and hotel are keys to the growth of the city, but the hotel should not be built at the expense of existing hotels.
“We were all here and everybody took a chance on Oklahoma City,” Williams said. “We don’t want to create a situation where that group of downtown hotels is left out in the cold.”
Williams also suggested a convention hotel be built in phases, but so that the construction would be seamless to the appearance of the hotel as new rooms are added.
A convention hotel could suffer a few slow years as event planners become familiar with the city and comfortable booking events here.
One hotel that could feel the pinch from a decline in convention traffic is the Renaissance Hotel, which operates all conference and banquet space at the Cox Convention Center, but General Manager Jeffrey Oliasami said he is not worried as any new convention center and hotel are at least a decade away.
The potential for a new convention center, how it would be paid for, where it would be built and how downtown hotels will be affected are issues likely to come into clearer focus if the convention center makes it onto a ballot as part of a MAPS III initiative.