Meeting Presenters: 

Bob Mills, Ocean Center
Evelyn Fine, Mid-Florida Research
David Moore, PFM, Financial Advisor
Jim Wachtel, Dickens & Associates

Audience Attendance: 

Larry Cohen Oceans Resorts
Gary Brown Sun Viking Lodge
Bob Davis Hotel/Motel Association
Sharon Mock DBACVB
Michael Porter CII
Rick Hamilton Ocean Center
Chad Smith Ocean Center
Rhonda Orr Volusia County Financial Services
Frank Gummy Legal Dept., Volusia County
Charlene Weaver CFO, Volusia County
Jay Glover PFM
Ann McFall Volusia County
Charles Fagan Ramada Inn Speedway
Jim Cameron Daytona Beach/Halifax Chamber of Commerce

Call to order

Board Chairman Dwight D. Lewis, called the TDC Board Meeting to Order at 9:00 a.m. With the exception of Steve McGuire and Christina Travis, all Board Members were present.

Approval of Minutes as Mailed

Minutes for the October 16, 2001, TDC Board Meeting were unanimously approved by Board Members upon the Motion of Lori Campbell- Baker and Seconded by Gilly Aguiar.

Mr. Lewis – called the roll to make sure everyone was in attendance, and introduced Dana Li, from the Best Western as the new member.

We have a presentation of the quarterly financial report by Bob Mills.

BOB MILLS – has been with the Ocean Center for about two months. What I have handed out is not necessarily the financial statement, I was thinking about the information everyone at this meeting was really interested in is to find out what kind of surplus the Ocean Center is running; and really taking a look at the bigger picture than just one quarter. Besides that, governmental accounting doesn’t take effect at the lightning speed that I’m used to in private industry, and the books are still open (believe it or not), so even though we ended the quarter and the year September 30th, a lot of things have not gelled yet and things still have to be done, and when you look at these figures, please remember they are extremely preliminary, and one of the first items is the Resort Tax which you are extremely interested in, it is extremely preliminary that is just an estimate, it is based on the activity that is the result of the receipts in the General Ledger to date. Not all of the resort tax that we will be receiving and allocating to us is reflected, so I put in there the estimate, actually I think it will probably be higher than that. I have broken down the resort tax, the income is derived from Events, Concessions, which is part of the events; Rentals which is basically an internal type of rental with Adventure Landing and Investments, that is the interest we earn on our fund balance and other sources of income.

Next is General Operating expenses, I’m not presenting this as you would normally a governmental entity, I’ve put this more in format that you would find in a "for profit" business. The margin from operations is almost always the one that most business people look at, and this year it is anticipated the margin should be about $449,000 to $450,000, and then we have Capital Expenditures, we have not spent all the money that was allocated for Capital Expenditures for the year, leaving us an excess revenue over expenses of $229,000 for the year, that adds down to the bottom line to increase your fund balance in a "for profit" business that’s your retained earnings; so we’ve added the $229,000 to the fund balance at the end of last year giving us approximately $1.9 million dollars in the Fund Balance.

MR. LEWIS – Any questions for Bob?

GILLY AGUAIR – On the rentals, you say that is mostly the lease with Adventure Landing, so that’ s money that we really don’t have, that’s accrual isn’t it?

BOB MILLS – No, they actually make monthly payments, there are actually two rentals that they give us, one is on the land, and the other is for parking space in the parking garage, but they are billed on a monthly basis and are paying us on a monthly basis also.

LORI CAMPBELL-BAKER – Am I understanding that on the first line we were budgeted for $1.8 million but we actually took in more resort tax as of this time?

BOB MILLS – That’s what I believe will happen, yes.

LORI CAMPBELL-BAKER – So that’s a projection on your part?

BOB MILLS – It is a projection on my part. Last year the final analyses the resort tax that was credited to the Ocean Center was a little over $2 million, I think it was $2 million $29 thousand dollars, somewhere in that range, and the broad data as to collection for this year is actually more than last year; so I anticipate it will be a little bit more than this.

MR. LEWIS – We don’t have this on the agenda, but I would like to ask Rick if he will discuss operation of what is going on, are you having any calls for conventions that you can’t handle, and how’s the business looking since…

RICK HAMILTON – Good question. Business is still looking good; we had a little downturn, or cancellation for the weeks after September 11th, but since then everything has picked back up. Of the two things that canceled, one came back, and it was bigger than it was before it canceled, so we feel very optimistic about everything that’s going on. Convention groups are calling, we are working closely with everyone, with the Ocean Walk Alliance, and things are looking good right now for us.

MR. LEWIS – So you haven’t seen a decline on the calls you’re still getting?

RICK HAMILTON – No, none what so ever.

MR. LEWIS – We are going to have a presentation by Evelyn Fine

Copies of the presentation of the Meeting Planners Discussion Group were handed out.

EVELYN FINE – When last you met, and we were looking at some of the plans for the center, I made the comment that the one thing we haven’t done to any extent is put the plans and some of the goals on a table in front of Meeting Planners, and we thought it would be useful to do that. As part of the research program, for the Convention and Visitors Bureau, we have planned some focus groups with Meeting Planners in places such as Washington D.C., Atlanta, etc.; some of the markets Meeting Planners would typically come to Florida from. We decided to allocate time at the most recent one in Washington D.C. for Meeting Planners to specifically discuss their requirements from a destination and a convention center. The planners that we recruited, for those not familiar with the process, we recruited planners from a facility in Washington D.C. but we also gave them a list of planners that Sally form the Visitors and Convention Bureau gave us, people that she felt might be interested, might be suitable, but they were planners that had to have used at least 1000 rooms in a Florida destination, and a Convention Center at least twice in the last four years. So, these are the list of people that we would hope would be on our list of prospects for any kind of future development, any kind of future expansion. The respondents were recruited from a list that the Convention and Visitors Bureau gave us.

We began the session by discussing a little bit about what has happened since September 11th, and I felt it was useful to know what was happening out there and what was on the Meeting Planners minds, and I will just point out that what Rick said was exactly right, they said that although for the first couple of weeks after September 11, they had some concerns about what was going on and had to cancel some short term business, they were seeing a big improvement, in fact they were seeing more people come to their meetings, and people seemed to be really dedicated to getting to meetings. Obviously in the north, a lot of the drive markets did exceptionally well, even so, they were looking at not changing any of their plans for future meetings and expected business to continue to be pretty good.

After discussing that we discussed nation choices, what went into that kind of choice, we discussed their convention center use and satisfaction with existing centers and we spent some time discussing their requirements from a convention center.

Finally the respondents were asked to consider changes to an existing hypothetical center. We said here is the break down in room allocation, for an existing anonymous center, this is what has been suggested and we would like you to tell us what you would like to see. Whether you would do what has been suggested, or if you would change, allocate in different ways, etc.

I would like to point out a couple things, first of all this is one focus group. As we plan our other focus groups over the next several months we will continue to ask these kinds of questions, and look at them. Since the responses were so homogeneous, since they were so clean on what they wanted, we felt it was useful to bring you what their major likes and concerns, etc. were. As always the Meeting Planners were very forthcoming, they like talking about what they want and don’t want. They are real clear on it, and again as always, what we found was that the Meeting Planners were really pretty cohesive in what they wanted, although, we would find someone out in space on one thing, for the most part, what their demands were, what they liked or didn’t like about convention centers was pretty clear, and pretty accurate for most of them.

About destinations, Florida remains a major meeting destination. You can’t beat the weather in Florida, and although they talk about the weather in other destinations such as Chicago, Las Vegas, etc., Florida is still #1 in terms of attracting their attendees. They want to meet in Florida, it gets them good attendance and certainly when talking about families, Florida is always positive. Most of these people were using either Miami Beach, Orlando and some were using Tampa as well, and they were exceptionally satisfied with all these cities. We did not hear any kind of major complaints about them. In fact, over the years we have heard people complain about the Orlando Convention Center, but this time around, what they are saying is they seem to have gotten their act together, they are more willing to talk to them, they have a different approach to marketing than they have had in the past and they were doing some really good business with them. Some said they wanted to use the Ft. Lauderdale and Ponte Vedra areas, but were having trouble getting into them, so the business is pretty strong in those areas. The interesting thing is they don’t know a lot about cities outside the major cities. When we read a list of cities to them, they were unaware of convention facilities in most places outside of the major cities. The factors that they consider when looking at cities in descending order (in your handout) are:

• Large properties with a range of 400-300 rooms

• Cost to organization of using the area

• Cost to attendees of using the area

• Having all meeting space under one roof

• Direct flights from major hubs (amount of carriers)

• Convention center functionality

• Major brand hotels

• Wide variety of priced properties

• Full service properties

• Family activities

• International Airport

• Available shuttle service between hotels & convention center

Accessibility of "night life" was a very minor issue for them. They were really looking for the business end of it, easy to get to, affordable and a functional convention center.

We then gave them a list and asked them to rank convention centers factors, and again, they are listed in descending order:

• Cost of facility and provided services

• Ample breakout rooms (average of 29)

• Exhibition hall layout and functionality

• Ample exhibit space (average 71,000 sq. ft.)

• Navigation from point to point within facility

• Meet & feed capability in the same facility (average 2000)

• Accessible & professional sales & planning and convention staff

• High quality food service operation (non-arena style)

• Recommendation of those who have used the facility before

• Shuttle service from hotels to facility

• Convenient parking

Also mentioned were ability for planners to control lighting/air without having to send for somebody and types of hotels in the vicinity of the center and conveniently located, well equipped office for their staff.

We then asked them about some specific factors, which might affect their convention center choice. The first one was: divided exhibition space in one or more areas, (i.e. foyers, hallways, separate buildings etc.) That was just not acceptable to them. Conference, meals, breakouts, in separate buildings such as a campus setting was just not acceptable to them. This was unanimous. Conference, meals, breakouts in both the convention center and adjacent hotels were acceptable in the proper circumstances. In other words, if you had a food function or breakout in a hotel in the morning and then went to the convention center for the balance of the day that would be acceptable; or if you had a function at the hotel at night after they left the convention center that was acceptable. They would not tolerate nor would they accept transferring between the hotels during the day, that was simply not acceptable. The use of multiple hotels and motorcoach shuttling between convention center and various locations was acceptable, maybe they don’t love it, but they are used to it and they understand that is what life is all about. They even have to do it in places like Miami and Orlando so they are not surprised by that. The respondents were used to and spent a lot of time in two story convention centers, but told me how important it was to have escalators and good navigation between the two floors, but again, that’s something they have had to become accustomed to.

We then put on the table the specs for the existing center, and we said, this is what exists, this is what is suggested, and again this is up to you to tell us what would work and what wouldn’t work. It was interesting, we showed it to them in three phases, but they didn’t like the idea of three phases. They said how do we buy a building that is maybe going to be here or there, the most they were comfortable with was two phases, they thought that a third phase with only 5000 sq. ft. didn’t make much sense to them, and again, that’s not their issue, they don’t care how we finance it or how the building is going to be built.

Only two respondents wanted additional Ballroom space; all wanted additional meeting space suggesting 25,000 to 105,000 sq. ft. About half wanted additional exhibit space suggesting 30,000 to 70,000 additional sq. ft.

Also, if you are thinking about renovating using state of the art audio-visual equipment, a non-arena feel to the space, good signage and staffing.

Again, this is just one discussion group, but what struck us was just how homogenous they were and how clear they were on certain specifics. Any questions?

JIM BAZEMAN – These are Meeting Planners? They are what I call people movers; don’t they basically decide where they are going to go?

EVELYN FINE – Yes.

JIM BAZEMAN – I’ve been told that less than 200 people actually book 75 to 80% of the business nationwide. Is that right?

EVELYN FINE – I don’t know, it’s not a figure I’ve ever heard.

JIM BAZEMAN – My point is this, we’ve been talking about exhibit space, now all of a sudden the people who bring people here want conference rooms. Are we headed in the wrong direction?

EVELYN FINE – Based on what these Meeting Planners have told us, conference and meeting space is what they are looking for.

GILLY AGAIUR – They need that for the breakouts, if it’s a company function or an industry, they are doing learning sessions and so forth, and the meeting space is quite important to just about everyone.

JIM BAZEMAN – If we had to make a choice right now, do we go for meeting space or exhibit hall. My point is this, we have "X" amount of dollars, my priority from what I have gathered so far is exhibition space, now I’m hearing this. When will you have other focus groups that you can report back to us?

EVELYN FINE – Probably the middle of January we will have completed the range.

TOM STAED – What was the size of these meetings?

EVELYN FINE – They used 1000 rooms.

TOM STAED – Ten Meeting Planners?

EVELYN FINE – Yes.

TOM STAED – They need 29 breakout rooms?

EVELYN FINE – They said they need an average of 29.

STUART ARP – Of those ten people how many actually have trade shows?

EVELYN FINE – They all had exhibit space. All indicated exhibit space was very important to them; they had to satisfy their exhibitors who are footing the bills in many ways, that was a profit center for them. So they wanted to make sure their exhibit space was successful that their planners were herded to and from the exhibit space is a natural flow of the meeting.

LORI CAMPBELL-BAKER – I think this is critical information, it is so easy to go down a path that is not the right path, and missed it completely. We were talking about moving to the next tier, and getting those meetings, but we could miss the boat completely by not building in what they need. I too, was surprised by 29 breakout rooms but it will be interesting to see what is coming up next with these groups.

JIM BAZEMAN – We have a building right now, do they know the size, shape and function of the building right now?

EVELYN FINE – They know the amount of space we allocate for each function of the building. Ballroom space, meeting space and exhibit space.

JIM BAZEMAN – What I’m saying is could we remodel to make it more acceptable to what they want with what we have? We ’re going to grow some, but did they have a chance to give you any input about this particular building?

EVELYN FINE – That’s what they did. They gave us the amount of space they would like to see in each one of those function spaces. We didn’t say design it, because that’s not their function. We just said, "How much space would you like to see added to this to make it functional for you and for you to consider this building."

MR. LEWIS – You say you are going to be meeting with another group?

EVELYN FINE – Yes sir, we are planning another group in Atlanta and possibly in Chicago as well. We are checking to see what the Meeting Planner behavior in those areas is right now.

MR. LEWIS – Do you have the numbers that you will be meeting with?

EVELYN FINE – We always do the same thing. Eight to ten planners in each group.

STUART ARP – What is the exhibit space we were considering? How many sq. ft. were we talking about?

JOHN MASIARCZYK – 124,000 sq. ft.

STUART ARP – We were talking about 124,000 sq. ft. and this group is saying 30,000 to 70,000 is what we need. Obviously we were doing a lot less breakout meeting space than they said we needed.

RICK HAMILTON – I don’t have the Johnson report with me Stuart, but I think it said that 70% of the groups within the continental United States used 100,000 sq. ft. or less. Evelyn, did you say you want to be able to feed 2000 people, but at the same time their least priority was another ballroom, and I don’t know how you’re going to feed them without ballrooms.

EVELYN FINE – Good point, but they were thinking they might have some of those food functions at a hotel.

LORI CAMPBELL-BAKER – When you were talking to them about Miami and places they know of do they know about Daytona Beach?

EVELYN FINE – No.

MR. LEWIS – Maybe you could ask them how they get information on places.

EVELYN FINE – That’s an ongoing process. They always want to hear from the town itself and from the local Visitor and Convention Bureau, they even wanted people there from the Airport and transportation industry when they make these kinds of decisions.

GILLY AGUAIR – The 1000 rooms, would that be considered the top tier? We thought if we did our space we would jump to the top of the second tier of convention centers, not going against the Orlando, Chicago, L.A. type of markets.

EVELYN FINE – Sally would be better able to answer that.

Gilly repeated his question for Sally to hear.

SALLY – I think it depends on the configuration of the meetings and what the real specs are, and a lot of the things we were trying to get our hands around is the number of rooms involved with the convention that also has a trade show that needs maximum space. There is a point at which you don’t get your return on investment based upon requirements of a meeting, so is this the upper second tier, I don’t think so, I don’t think we’re there yet. I think this would be very medium size in terms of centers around the country. I talked to a man from Virginia Beach yesterday, and he said that unless we get in the mode of a 25 year plan, we look to expand or renovate every seven or eight years, to do this on a piecemeal basis is not a good approach. I thought that was good advice. What we are doing now is just bringing ourselves up to where we should be or could be to do good media conventions, but we need to talk also about our long-range plans.

STUART ARP – A 1000 room convention is not a top tier convention. You are talking 3000 to 4000 rooms for these big centers. This is the kind of thing we should be listening to. If you break down all my meeting space, new and existing, I have 31 rooms. No one is going to come in and break them all out. When we have a potential customer what do they need, and what don’t we have? I am not booking when they need exhibit space that I cannot provide. We have the issue of going back and forth across the street, and that is an issue. We’ve talked about the garage and the beach shops connected; maybe we do another connector with our building to try to bring that all together.

The next ten people you talk to may give you another answer.

EVELYN FINE – Most of what we heard was not a surprise, in terms of "under one roof" that sort of thing. We’ve never looked at specific numbers before and that is what we are continuing to gather. But, they’ve always been clear about convenience being important, that accessibility, mobility, functionality.

GILLY AGUIAR – About the meeting space, 29 might be a good number, but I don’t think they all have to be quite as big. A room this size is considered meeting space, as long as it has the audio/visual hookups to do power point and slide shows etc. to have their meeting. Some rooms could be about this size and typical ones that I see when we go to conventions are about 40’ x 80’, it’s just enough room to put chairs, and have a meeting.

EVELYN FINE – There was one other interesting point, we had one person there who was a Meeting Planner for Communication Workers of America, and because they have to use union facilities they are more and more out of places to go. We have always heard the other side, that unions are expensive to use, but it seems that not just unions but other associations are looking for places to make them feel good about who they do business with. They are narrowing the places they can go, not expanding them.

GILLY AGUIAR – Another interesting observation is that they want the space to be comfortable, not an arena type space.

EVELYN FINE – They’ve been to arena’s they don’t want to do it if they don’t have to. We heard so many comments about the Orlando facility, that it is an elegantly done building, that they felt it was a real professional building, and what was interesting is that people used to complain that it was to big. Orlando has figured out how to put multiple meetings in their space, and each one of them feels that they own that space. They have done a good job of turning around a problem that they had and that we have been hearing for years. They say if they are in Orlando and they are in one end of the building they know their headquarters hotel is the Peabody, if they are in the other end they know their headquarters hotel is the Omni. They have easy access to it and it is no longer a problem, so that huge building, that for years was a liability, is not to these big planners any longer.

SALLY – There were three of the planners who commented that Orlando was the best of the seven or eight that they have used. And most of these people have been just about everywhere and are used to the very, very best facility, so they really know exactly what they want.

GILLY AGUIAR – The one thing about the Orlando center is it is still a nightmare to get to and from in the morning and afternoon, and that is another reason they want everything under one roof.

TOM STAED – I think you need to also refine what kind of conventions or meetings are we really searching for in this community. It’s a different kind of convention that brings in a lot of people that is spread up and down the beach than the one that brings in a thousand people who want one convention we need to have the ability to do those 5000 to 6000 person meetings that spread this thing up and down the beach and not just centralized. Certainly the majority of them are going to be the centralized ones, but we also need to do that, and I’m not sure what kind of convention people those ten folks were.

EVELYN FINE – Let me remind you that it was 1000 minimum rooms, some of them were well up from that. We can specify who we want and Sally gave them a list of who we felt was appropriate for us. But down the road, we can recruit by any specs.

TOM STAED – We need to spec out what kind of groups we are really searching for. The people who are using Vegas, Orlando and Chicago are very rarely going to come to even an expanded one here. In my opinion a Best Western that has 4500 to a convention will have things that this facility will probably never have.

MR. LEWIS – I thought it interesting that in their destination response they said there were too many distractions in Orlando. There are some kinds of conventions, like you were saying Tom; they go to Vegas to have fun and they wanted the distractions. The kind that we want, I would think, are the kinds that don’t want too many distractions.

Who are we trying to attract, and what do they want or need, before we go further than that.

EVELYN FINE – These people were people that Sally thought had potential to be here. They were our market. They did fit our demographic and our character. People that we would go after.

JIM BAZEMORE – The fact that we are on the beach our biggest asset right over there, a block away, did that come into play at any time?

EVELYN FINE – I have to tell you that in all the years we’ve been doing focus groups with Meeting Planners, the one thing they’ve never said that was important to them was the beach. Orlando doesn’t have a beach, Miami Beach does, but the convention center is not on the beach. We thought outdoor activities might be important, it’s not, even golf. Although they like to play after, everybody has golf. The same things that attract a leisure group do not attract these major groups. They ’re very specific, very business like.

GILLY AGUIAR – The beach would become a factor if they bring their families.

JIM BAZEMORE – Or staying longer, or coming earlier.

MR. LEWIS – This is just one group, we are attracting another facet of the convention business that attracts another type of group.

Audience Question:

Gary Brown, Sun Viking Lodge

Would there be any benefit to looking at the parallels between us and Orlando, as far as they have been through three or four renovations, and to see by what percentage they increased exhibit space, what percentage they increased breakout rooms and conference space and if each year they keep adding one segment and one keeps shrinking. We might be able to extract some information from them, obviously we are never going to be in that market, but if we see their trend we may be able to benefit from them. Each time they make an addition there might be something there that will benefit us.

MR. LEWIS – I think that would be good information for us to have. Even if we aren’t in that same market, we are in the same region and will tend to follow those trends down the road, I would think. So I think that is information we need to look at.

STUART ARP – We need to look at if we have "x" amount of exhibit space currently, and they’re saying 30,000 to 70,000 additional look at other exhibit space that meet that criteria and say do you need more breakouts, how many do you have, what are the complaints about your facility and does this work for the type of things for that size group.

MR. LEWIS – I think this is some of the most important information that we’ve gotten, and I want to thank Sharon Mock, she’s the one that had it put on the agenda. It has been important to all of us. The concern about getting down the road in our thoughts without doing enough research and going the wrong way, is a very dangerous thing. I think we really need to do the research and the way we are headed is the proper way. I’m sure everybody here wants to hear the report when you’ve finished the next meeting in January.

JIM BAZEMORE – Let me ask her to come back after each one and give us a report.

MR. LEWIS – Thank you very much Evelyn.

GILLY AGUIAR – I guess it shows that campus concept wasn’t good.

MR. LEWIS – Now we’re going to have another discussion, I know Charlene did this earlier, but no matter what we want, we have to be able to fund it. There’s a ceiling to the amount of money we have to work with, or debt service that we can afford to pay back. As I was looking at our projected phases, and I think phase I was $60 million, that can’t be phase I, we don’t have $60 million. Phase II on down the road. We need to make sure what kind of revenues we have or ability for debt service and make sure that money is reflected in our phasing that we are looking at. Then we have to make we’re on board and get that funding everybody’s looking at and we’re talking about, and that’s the extra 1% on the resort tax. Charlene, would you tell us about that?

CHARLENE WEAVER – Good Morning, thank you for inviting us back, and hopefully we will provide some helpful information to you. I did ask David Moore, our financial advisor with Volusia County to join us. David, you might want to sit up there next to Dwight. His assistant Jay Glover is also here. I wanted to briefly remind you of a couple of things; the last time we were here we gave some information to you, and we’ll go over that again today if you would like to have that. Without the extra penny, we have about $10 million, which probably won’t do too much for your plans. With the extra penny, based on the pro forma financial statements, which were done by Johnson Group, we used the amount we showed for debt service, which was around $2 million. All of the growth, however, was used for operating beyond that point, so that was the perimeters we used; that we had $2 million for debt service, and what that would generate. David ran a couple of scenarios whether it was 20 or 30 years, and he can go over those with you, but it’s not anywhere close to $60 million, so we’ve got some issues we ’ve got to sort out; either we’re going to devote more to debt service and less to operating or we’re going to pare back the building program, whatever you decide.

MR. LEWIS – Charlene, you’re basing this strictly on the Halifax Area’s?

CHARLENE WEAVER – Yes, the portion that’s collected in the Halifax Areas.

TOM STAED – Not the entire county?

MR. LEWIS – The other two cents has been pledged by the entire county to get the funding for this, but additionally, we’re looking right now at the Halifax portion. If we can do it all together that’s part of the discussion. If we want to have it for the south west or the south east and the west, that’s different, and we’ll have to see if they will buy into it. David…

David Moore passed out a packet to the Board Members.

DAVID MOORE – What I passed around is the same thing we looked at two or three months ago, if you’ve got the book from the last time, there’s nothing different. We looked at market conditions, interest rates are almost identical to what they were last time, so Charlene asked that I reinforce and update what we talked about last time. The first page is tracking the bonds that financed this facility. The third and fourth pages are the numbers that we should go over. The bottom of the third page just highlighted using the same debt service that you are paying right now, but extending it out an extra 20 or 30 years you can pick up an extra $10.5 million at twenty years, and just short of $17 million if you went up to thirty years. Assuming you can use the revenues you have now for the next thirty years you would get that much extra. That does involve going back and restructuring the existing debt. That would have a small cost, about $1000 to do that, in order to get to the $17 million. If interest rates were to rise in the next year or two, the cost of doing the restructuring would increase. If you get the $17 million now and to do the restructuring costs you half a million dollars it’s a dollar for dollar decrease in the benefit to you. So, keep in mind as you move forward you are going to assume these numbers are available, if interest rates go up, that number goes down. On the last page, as Charlene referenced, this assumes that all $2 million per year from the Halifax area that additional 1% is available. If any of that needs to be used for operations, you would have to decrease the amount you can borrow. For 20 years you can get about $20 million for 30 years you could get about $30 million. That would be in addition to the amount you can get by just restructuring the existing debt, so the total would be around $45 million for 30 year financing. That’s the long and short of it. Just a brief comment, tourist development tax revenues have had a pretty big test after September 11th, and Orange County and Osceola County in particular, as you all probably know took a huge hit, and that has caused the financial markets to look at these types of financing much more critically.

RICK HAMILTON – I have been told that to do an issue now on tourist ties, you have to have a secondary pledge to back it up. Is that true or untrue?

DAVID MOORE – It would depend on how much you are borrowing, if you were borrowing the max here, they’re just looking for coverage, if you were only using half the revenues that were available you are fine; but if you were doing something that would require the use of all the revenues and your pro forma for operating the facility uses every other penny, then you would need some sort of back up.

MR. LEWIS – What is the tourist tax since September, do you have those figures Charlene? It’s about flat isn’ t it from where we were last year?

CHARLENE WEAVER – We’re on track.

MR. LEWIS – So we haven’t taken the hit they have in Orlando.

CHARLENE WEAVER – Listening to Rick this morning it sounds like we’re going to be OK, our sales tax is even holding so far, but that remains to be seen if it holds.

RICK HAMILTON – There’s a huge difference, like Evelyn alluded to, Daytona is a drive market, and Orlando gets a great deal of business through air travel, and that industry is suffering.

JIM BAZEMORE – If you had to have back up, what are you talking about?

DAVID MOORE – A pledge from some other entity, whether it was from the county or a letter of credit from a bank, the bottom line is, they just want to see some coverage, if you have a real tight pro forma they are going to look to the people that are behind you.

JIM BAZEMORE – Since this is County owned and operated would they look at the county as a whole?

DAVID MORE – We’ve seen facilities where some of the businesses involved were hotels and restaurants, we’ve seen areas where they have occasionally gotten together and put some sort of assessment behind them also. There are all sorts of structures out there, but the most common would be some sort of back up, which I believe originally there was some sort of back up from the county and the city…

FRANK GUMMY – Just the city.

DAVID MORE – So there are all sorts of places you can go to get it. But that’s a deal some people would have to cut.

GILLY AGUIAR – But that would go away by the time we were looking for the money.

DAVID MOORE – I think that if what you said about your collections is true, the tests that you have had in the last three or four months, is a pretty significant test as to what would happen in a crisis to your tourist development tax revenues. The fact that they have been fairly stable… Right now it might be very difficult to get financing, but as things get settled, even four or five months from now you could go and show them that even through September and October the revenues have either had modest increases or have been flat. You’ve got a pretty good case that you are different from Orlando or particularly Osceola County which is devastated, I think 20% to 30% off.

TOM STAED – What months have you calculated the tax through?

CHARLENE WEAVER – Through September and October, we have November’s as well.

TOM STAED – So you’re a month behind?

CHARLENE WEAVER – We don’t have December’s yet, but we have October and November.

GILLY AGUIAR – September was down, October was flat, right? And then November was up 2%.

TOM STAED – You get it a month later, so when you’re talking about September, you really mean August revenue.

CHARLENE WEAVER – We are a month behind, we have November reported which would be for the month of October.

FRANK GUMMY – That’s correct.

TOM STAED – I have one more question, you have the revenue and expenses, operating and debt service mixed together, and long ago we used to keep the debt separate. The bond revenue from the TDC created a surplus throughout the early stages when they weren’t mixed together. We used to keep the operating expenses separate, and make the facility generate its own operating expenses. This is combining them, there’s probably no other way to do it anymore; but it cuts down on the amount of money used for bonds.

MR. LEWIS – I think we can break it out, so at least we can look at it.

TOM STAED – Historically if that number is growing then we’re not going to get very much.

JIM BAZEMORE – Originally, we wanted the center to just break even, then we could take that additional money and use it for advertising, a sort of self generating thing. That was our goal. I don’t think we ever got there, but it’s what we tried to get to.

FRANK GUMMY – I was here too, and I don’t remember this center ever projected to produce revenues to cover its expenses.

JIM BAZEMORE – I didn’t say projected, I said our goal!

RICK HAMILTON – David, if I understand you correctly, shouldn’t we go ahead and refinance and put the $17 million in an escrow account if the market is favorable at this time?

DAVID MOORE – The refinancing does not produce any savings today. It would be a $120,000 loss today. You are right, rates are very low today, and if you had a project defined, if you were willing to do that and take out the cost associated with the old debt, but there are tax restrictions about when you spend the money, you have to have a project well defined before you can go out and borrow. There are issues we would have to work through with bond counseling before you could just go out and issue them.

RICK HAMILTON – So you can’t do it without a project?

DAVID MOORE – You have to have a pretty good thought about what the project is going to be. In the old days, when you borrowed money you could make a little bit on it, now days you can’t.

MR. LEWIS – What are we paying for interest rate right now?

DAVID MOORE – It’s 5.5% I believe and now you’re about 5%.

MR. LEWIS – It’s interesting to me, when you talk about expansion, and you talk about Orlando being down 20% and we’re not down very much and it’s a drive-in business that we have here, but yet, Evelyn said that when she met with these planners they were still doing conventions. Are they driving more to the conventions?

EVELYN FINE – Conventions are planned several years out, so they’re projecting for the business that’s ongoing, but yes, conventions are still filling up. I think it is the leisure market Orlando is losing all the business on. Their convention center made up within a few weeks, so I think the leisure is where they’re losing business. St. Augustine, for instance, is down 27% and that’s all leisure.

GILLY AGUIAR – We need to look at these planners and see how many of these convention people are within driving time from here because of the airline problems.

STUART ARP – That’s D.C. which is primarily national association, so that would not be drive in people.

EVELYN FINE – The vast majority of the large ones are like that. That’s why we’re going to Atlanta and going to Tallahassee as well.

GILLY AGUIAR – I think that is important too, how many groups do we have that are within drive range.

STUART ARP – Maybe do something in Tallahassee about the big state associations that we can’t do now. They’re limited to the State of Florida, so they’re looking at Orlando, Tampa and Miami circuit. How many more of those can we capture?

Audience Remark:

Sharon Mock, Daytona Beach Area Convention & Visitors Bureau

Sharon Mock – Stuart’s right Tallahassee and in Washington D.C. where we did the focus group, there are probably 20,000 associations headquartered in Washington D.C. They’re not likely to be a drive-in market. Your drive-in market is your religious groups, those kinds of groups that will bring their families and come from all over.

STUART ARP – Regional associations can be based from anywhere, but Atlanta’s not a bad place for regional association to be based out of and even some in Florida, that might be the next thing to look at.

MR. LEWIS – I haven’t heard a lot of discussion about the funding being the 1% addition to the tourist development tax. Is anyone admittedly against that, or is it a consensus that this is the way it should be funded.

JIM BAZEMORE – The only way sir? How about letting someone else carry some of the load, such as the restaurants and things of that nature, because up till this time the hospitality industry has carried everything. And yet, they certainly benefit. Certainly, when Stuart’ s full this town does a lot of business.

MR. LEWIS – This has to be solved. If that is the case, it isn’t going to come out of the general fund and out of the county tax coffers, I can assure you of that. And I don’t think you could pass ½% sales tax right now. This is the only funding method I can see right now, so if anyone has another idea we need to get it on the table right now and look at it.

GILLY AGUIAR – Frank, isn’t there a Florida State Statute for a taxing district in what we perceive to be the value added area?

FRANK GUMMY – No.

GILLY AGUIAR – So if we were to extend the bonds we have and have the penny we would have $73 million.

DAVID MOORE - $45 million. The things that are generally looked at for these things are different restaurant taxes, rental car taxes, etc. You could try to do some type of assessment program, but I don’t know how that would work.

STUART ARP – Could you do a combination, ½ a penny from hotel, and look at restaurant and car rental as a way to offset some of that?

RICK HAMILTON – It takes a legislative act

FRANK GUMMY – You would have to pass a general law for the whole state to do it.

STUART ARP – Not likely.

FRANK GUMMY – I haven’t noticed them passing a lot of laws for additional taxes.

DAVID MOORE – I think Orlando and Tampa have looked at some of these types of things. First, I don’t think you could get it through Tallahassee, and there has never been a time when the people wanting this type of thing adopted are on the same page. And in the end they find out it is not as much money, locals go to the restaurants, there are a lot of reasons why it ends up not working.

JIM BAZEMORE – Bottom line, it’s easy to add a penny, I think the County Council has the right to do it right now. In other words, the County Council can do it right now, but in the hospitality industry how much can we handle? As I’ve said before, I’ve actually heard people ask the rate, then how much tax is on top, and if you think people aren’t watching that, particularly in a downturn they are counting those pennies, and I am concerned what they are charging in Washington and Philadelphia, I believe Dwight went somewhere where it was 12% to 15%; and New York went up high and came back down. I’m just trying to spread the load, we do need it. There are other people out there that want our business, and the beach can only draw so much.

MR. LEWIS – I think that’s healthy discussion, and I want to hear what everybody thinks about this. But till we solidify that and know where we are getting financing we’re just doing a lot of talking. If the consensus of this group is we are not going to do it that way, we may need to postpone a few things. It depends on whether we feel this expansion is needed and we want to do it as a community. If we do, in my opinion, this is the only way we’re going to get it done.

JIM BAZEMORE – Before it was county wide, we thought the whole county wanted it. It’s the only really big one in the area. Now, on the next expansion you are taking out the southwest and southeast, so that leaves the Halifax area, which carries the bulk of the load anyway, because the rooms are over here. Every time you take something out of the pot there is that much less, which we have to raise here. We used to have 19,000 rooms; we have 13,000 rooms now. Our income is reduced, we have more load and we all want it.

MR. LEWIS – Even within the Halifax area you have some of the smaller hotels and motels who feel like they don’t benefit from it and they’re not all supportive of the expansion, because they don’t see the benefit of it to themselves. When the building was first built Deltona wasn’t even a city. If we are going to get money from these areas, even though they don’t want a convention center in their area, they only have so much tax revenue and they need to spend it where it will do their citizens the most good. If you look at what is collected in the southeast or the southwest it is not as much as in the Halifax area, so I don’t think that makes a very big difference anyway.

GILLY AGUIAR – We took that penny in southeast and it generates $200,000 towards our budget. So it’s not going to be very much. Even with the penny, we don’t have enough money to do Phase I.

MR. LEWIS – That depends on what Phase I is and that’s why we haven’ t locked in what to do.

GILLY AGUIAR – One question I have for Rick, if we could get the financing could this place be self sufficient if you were operating on a "full time" basis?

RICK HAMILTON – You’re saying that we break even operationally, is that right?

GILLY AGUIAR - Yes, if you’re running trade shows etc.

RICK HAMILTON - Saving more debt. No. That’s not going to happen.

GILLY AGUIAR - No, I don’t mean the debt on the building, I mean the actual payroll, stagings, work, etc.

RICK HAMILTON – In the convention industry, everything is an economic impact to the community, and not to the facility.

GILLY AGUIAR – So we have to ask the general public to be behind supporting this facility, so it will bring dollars to the community. We need to have an idea of what that amount is.

LORI CAMPBELL-BAKER – Do we have a report like that?

GILLY AGUIAR – Like Tom said, if we break out the operational part of this, then project what it would be if we had 200+ days a year…

RICK HAMILTON – Again, I think that information is in the Johnson Report.

LORI CAMPBELL-BAKER – I think it will be impossible to pass a tax right now. When we get to it we need a lot of back up information to tell people this is good for them, and not just for the facility. It is not a money maker for the facility, but it is for the community.

STUART ARP – If you look at the tax of other counties that were provided a few months ago, we’re on the high end, but if you look at the real tourist areas i.e., Orange, Osceola, Pinellas, Dade, Hillsborough, we’re still behind some of those. Could we change the way we divide the 5% bed tax as a way to help out.

MR. LEWIS – Charlene would you get us an update on this, there were a lot of taxes passed between July when this came out and now.

TOM STAED – What is the hotel community position on this, both the association and the small hotels.

Gary Brown, Sun Viking

That’s a good question, there is both sides to the argument. Obviously the smaller the property the less interest there is and the benefit they see from having a convention center. The smaller property owners will probably be less supportive that the larger property owners will be.

TOM STAED – Has the hotel association taken a position on this?

GARY BROWN – No we have not.

TOM STAED – The statute that allowed you to split the first one, now allows you to split the thing without getting another one passed?

FRANK GUMMY – The third cent, we believe could be levied on a less than county wide basis.

STUART ARP – This one that I have is dated December of 2000. It is a year old. Tampa is 11.75% Dade is 13.5%, but that depends on where they are located. Pinellas which is St. Petersburg is 11%, Osceola is 12% and Orange is 11%. These are the main people we are competing with.

MR. LEWIS – We are 11.5% right now with the new ½% school tax.

TOM STAED – There are only two counties that are ahead of us with the 11.5%.

JIM BAZEMORE – So if we put another penny on we would go to 12.5%. Is that not one of the highest in the state?

STUART ARP – Yes, except for Dade, it would be the highest.

MR. LEWIS – You said you were going to add what some of them have passed. You added ours, but not theirs.

STUART ARP – Duvall is 12.5%, that is Jacksonville. Their convention facility there is not much bigger than this one, in terms of size.

MR. LEWIS – I think you in the hotel association need to discuss this more, you are the ones who benefit from it. When people come here and enjoy themselves, they come back. They don’t necessarily go to the same hotel, they go to other areas. And I think we have all benefited from the Ocean Center being here. If the Ocean Center wasn’t here I don’t think we would have 13,000 rooms.

GARY BROWN – Remember that most of the hotels and motels in Florida are 50 rooms and less.

TOM STAED – The bottom line is the convention center benefits a broad segment of the population.

MR. LEWIS – OK. Mr. Wachtel, what can you do for $10 million?

Jim Wachtel of Dickens & Associates passed out a packet to the Board members.

JIM WACHTEL – The good news is Phase I we have been talking about is not $60 million like somebody said, the bad news it is more than $17 million that we’ve been talking about.

As I sat here and listened, basically what we have done is talk theory and philosophy and a lot of nice things. My charge from the last meeting was to start putting something down in concrete that really meets the needs that we find from Evelyn and the rest of the community. We need to decide on what size is Phase I, what size is going to be the full build-out, and how much is it going to cost. Then we have the problem of how to pay for that.

The first step is to get all of these interests together, and turn out a concrete set of guidelines and goals, that we are going to provide so many square feet of exhibition space, and so much meeting room, and we have to have so much pre-function space to make it all happen, and it has to fit with the existing building. That conceptual planning is the next step. It involves all of the stakeholders, not just the design team. We would be the leaders and facilitators of the organization, but it would be directed by the Ocean Center, it would have to include the Convention & Visitors Bureau, we would have to ask the Hotel/Motel Association to be involved. We would try to get Charlie Johnson involved since his pro forma’s have been the basis of this all the way along. We would ask Stuart to get the HPE people in to lend their expertise, and if appropriate we would get the Chamber of Commerce and the economic resources of the county together and decide how much we need to have; and that the facility we are going to build is actually going to bring in the conventions, and be that tool that we need to develop this industry.

What we see is a starting point of a day long meeting, a big brainstorming charette that would bring all these people together, look at the amount of money we have, what has been recommended; put all that into a master design document. Look at the design criteria we would need to have such as the volume of the space, how big does the exhibition space need to be, how big does the meeting room need to be? How do people circulate from this facility to that facility to the parking garage, to outside areas? Then develop a document that says "we’re going to have 70,000 square feet of exhibition space, and that requires so much support space" then let our designers develop a concept that really fits on the site. In my investigations of a couple months ago, we know that most of this will fit on the site, but it will be tight. What decisions do we make, do we go up to a second floor, do we try to make it a little smaller, and how are we going to do that?

Over a course of about two months, to through a process to decide upon how much square footage that’s got to be in the eventual build-out. Phase I, which is important to everybody, and how is that actually going to function in the environment we’ve got here? That becomes the actual discussion point, how much will it cost, when will it be on line and how much money is it going to bring in.

I anticipated that the first task could take place after the first of the year, but I think after listening to Evelyn that we may want to wait till after her next focus group, and use that information along with this to start that planning process.

We will have a hard time making this happen without support from the whole community. We want a facility that is going to compete with Orlando, Miami and Jacksonville. It has to have a thorough review of everything going on and a thorough and professional product.

Construction would start somewhere about the middle of 2003 and projecting a year for construction. So the facility is not going to be on line till 2004, and that is when the bulk of the money is going to be needed. It is not going to be tomorrow, it is going to be 2 ½ years from now.

JOHN MASIARCZYK – Someone mentioned planning 25 years ahead. I look at these maps and charts and focus groups, and I agree, I think we need to have a lot more focus groups. We’re in a locked area here. We are 17 years from when the original building was planned. If we are thinking of doubling it again, how are you going to do it, where? Would it not be prudent to look at the location? There is no reason that the Ocean Center as it sits could be modified somewhat. All these things that have been said here were not taken into consideration. Like the airport. They talk about traffic; some of you drive over here all the time. I drive over here occasionally; to me it’s a nightmare getting here. We have people coming from out of state; this is not an easy place to get to.

STUART ARP – Where are you going to move it where there are hotels. Jacksonville has their convention center a mile from their hotels and they are probably going to move it.

JOHN MASIARCZYK – Based on everything I’m hearing, people want easy access. If you build a convention center, the hotels will come. No matter where you build it.

STUART ARP – It didn’t happen in Jacksonville.

JOHN MASIARCZYK – Again, I don’t know your business at all, I’m just saying that based on everything I’ve heard this morning, this location may not be the best location, because it doesn’t give you expanding room unless you displace more and more of your other areas. We need to think about 25 years from now where we want to be. We are putting a burden on everybody. You are talking about extending 1983’s notes, creative ways of financing. You are in a pretty locked area here. I just felt I had to say it.

GILLY AGUIAR – One of the things I brought up in the earlier meetings, being everything to everybody. I had talked to Jim about remodeling the Ocean Center and doing away with the ice skating and the concerts. They have one ice skating event in March, booked for the year. What will it take to fill this space? You will still get your church groups, they will sit in chairs and they do at the other facilities. Being everything to everybody is very expensive, then you run into the issue of the land. This is a very good size building, where half your meeting space could be along the sides and fill in the electric we need. Taking away the arena effect. It might be cost effective to use this as the expansion then come back and put the archways and so forth in the middle and tie it all together but you can close it off, like Orlando does. They don’t have concerts at their facility; they have a place for concerts. They want to have meetings. We have spent 17 years trying to be everything to everybody, but yet not being enough for anybody. You can’t take a first tier concert because the tickets would be so outrageous, you don’t get much ice skating, we tried the franchises, with hockey and so forth, is that an option to people?

TOM STAED – The community was promised a multiple use building, how that would float is undetermined.

GILLY AGUIAR - Even with graduation, we could put chairs on the floor of the exhibit space. I don’t see anything that we are trying to do that couldn’t be done if we brought the building up to what we are trying to build. We are taking $160,000 out of Rick’s pocket and asking him to make the money work. We would gain a lot of space because you also have the problem of the walkways from the front of the buildings. I think Stuart is right, at some point we need to make a walkway over to those facilities. I don’t think the community would be that upset with us. I think they have seen that we can’t be everything to everybody with this size of building. You probably hear it more here than I do in the southeast, but I think we have an antiquated building for what we built it for.

STUART ARP – We could still do the Home & Garden shows and that type of community thing.

GILLY AGUIAR – If you brought it up you could do all the electric the way it should be. Take some of the seating and extend the hallways out, make it a very plausible walkway coming from the hotels across the street instead of people coming up and letting people out on the street. I just don’t know how much it would cost.

JIM WACHTEL – I think that’s something that could be investigated here, the feasibility of having the arena and the multi-purpose space, and what do you gain.

GILLY AGUIAR – You could take some of the seating from the arena area. I don’t know about the design factors, but you would still have the atrium effect.

STUART ARP – If you look at the diagram you could probably double your space.

RICK HAMILTON – You have to remember all your service areas are under the seats. If you take out the seats you have to relocate your service areas, the mechanical, the electrical etc.

JIM WACHTEL – I don’t think it is feasible to take that stuff out, but it may be feasible to build some other meeting spaces, breakout rooms, etc. up in where the seating is, and still have some walkways to the front and the back of the building.

STUART ARP – To add the breakout space, let’s say convert the ballroom to exhibit space then add whatever more meeting space we need. That would give you 60,000, and they are saying they want 30,000 to 70,000 over what we have. I guess they want 30,000 to 70,000 over what we already have?

RICK HAMILTON – When you take out the wall we have 60,000 now, the walls to the service quarters. But then you don’t have the meeting facilities and the breakout rooms.

GILLY AGUIAR – Maybe this could be the two story start of it. We go with what we have on the floor as exhibit space and have enough escalator movement, etc. to move them up to breakout rooms upstairs, and bring them back down into that and that goes straight through. So now your space can be divided. I don’t know; I’m not an architect.

RICK HAMILTON – I don’t know either, but I think Jim can take a look at that, when he gets into it, I think you’ll find it’s more expensive than to build the space.

FRANK GUMMY – What are your arena revenues, Rick?

RICK HAMILTON – I would have to look, approximately $160,000.

GILLY AGUIAR - $160,000 last year with four concerts. It’s just something I’m throwing out there. Over a twenty-five year period we’re going to fill into a spot where we’re comfortable, and I don’t think we will want to grow any further trying to chase bigger and bigger conventions. I think we will find our niche and keep it up, keep it nice, and keep the quality of the service will be what we will be doing at that point. I don’t think we will be chasing the Orlando’s and building. We won’t have the space; we won’t have the hotel rooms for it.

TOM STAED – I’d like to see what you have been putting in here, historically. How far back would you have that information?

RICK HAMILTON – All the way.

TOM STAED – It would be interesting to see, and I think that’s another issue. Hoteliers are going to want to know before they enthusiastically agree to put another penny on their head. Just what is the marketing plan going to be? Is it going to be conventions that all fit in the center of the community, or is it going to be meetings and exhibits and events that spread the entire length of the beach?

RICK HAMILTON – We gave you a break down of the events at one of the first meetings.

GILLY AGUIAR – It was four concerts last year.

RICK HAMILTON – As we go forward we are having less and less concerts and more meetings and conventions, which is what we’ re supposed to do.

MR. LEWIS – I don’t think we’re at the point of thinking about a central planning phase till we think about where we’re…Yes, ma’am.

SHARON MOCK – Excuse me, I think many of the convention groups we have are repeat business. Once they come here they really do like it, and they want to come back. Now geographically, some of them have to move around the country, so we may only get them once every five years, but they do come back. We have a good track record with that.

MR. LEWIS – Let’s get the information about the trend in Orlando, what they are getting more of and less of, whether it affects us or not, I’d like to see that. Evelyn will have another meeting in January where we can get some more information as to what the planners are looking for. I think we need to look at that before doing a contract to the council to approve. We need to know exactly where we want to go.

GILLY AGUIAR – I agree, we need to let Evelyn go. We need to get the numbers and find out what the financial burden is as far as the operational expense there.

RICK HAMILTON – It’s huge.

GILLY AGUIAR – I know it’s huge, but the place is huge, and if you took it by the square foot and figured it out it might give us an idea what our operational budget is going to be to run this place.

MR. LEWIS – Rick, would you work on that information?

RICK HAMILTON – Yes sir.

MR. LEWIS – I think we have had a good meeting. I think we have done a 180 degree turn in some places, but I think it’s important we do this, so we don’t go off in the wrong direction without examining where we are trying to get to. We’ll get another meeting set up. We’ll try to get this information first, I don’t think we’ll have a meeting in January, if you get a cancellation notice, it’s because we don’t have anything together for you.

Is there any old business?

New business?

JOHN MASIARCZYK – I’ve had a couple people ask me, and it makes it easier with Ms. Li here from the Deltona area. There’s been some talk about withdrawing the southwest and the southeast Volusia money from the Halifax area budgeting. Meaning that money’s not going to be there. Is this the area where ideas and suggestions should be brought up about southwest Volusia? For future building. We’ve got a consideration in our area that we’ve got to do something because of Sanford and Seminole County. I don’t know if anyone has seen their plan for convention space down on the river; it’s substantial. I don’t know what it does to the Ocean Center, and us but with all the building and all the growth down in the Heathrow area, I imagine they will pull a lot of stuff in there. Most of those buildings are not equipped to hold large gatherings, and I think that’s the real reason for it. We’ve looked at it, and started talking about it, and there is some talk going on in the community. Would it be easier to work with this group, or do you want us to set up a group down there to start talking on their own. I don’t want to come in here and say we want to withdraw our money from what’s going on, because I too think the Ocean Center needs to be vital, we need it for Volusia County. We have no intentions of that kind of facility down there, nor do I suggest that we move, when I talked about moving, this location down there. We’re happy, you keep it!

But, we do need to put in a large facility, graduating our kids from High School is something I’ve thought about for years. The parents don’t like the idea of them having to drive all the way to Daytona for graduation. The schools don’t have a facility big enough, so we are looking at building a facility down there. Do you want that information brought through here or do we not want to muddy this water, and get a group down there?

MR. LEWIS – I don’t think we need to muddy this water. I think you need this kind of group the re, but what you end up with these things, and we need to discuss them, if it’s only going to be the Halifax area’s money backing…

FRANK GUMMY – The two cents is matched county wide.

MR. LEWIS – It’s just the one cent.

JOHN MASIARCZYK – I know that, and I’m not trying to change that. We’re starting to talk about the future. Talking about separating that money, so that is another source of revenue to pull off what we want down in that area. I didn’t want it to be a conflict or a misunderstanding that when we start talking about a building down there that it has anything to do with what we’re doing here.

MR. LEWIS – I think you need to keep that separate. You need to form a group down there. I think what we need to decide if the additional penny is only going to be from the Halifax area, why would you be sitting here determining what’s going to happen with it? I don’t think this is the place to talk about another project.

JOHN MASIARCZYK – I just think support for a project this big needs to be county wide. When you talk numbers this big to the average person, he’s going to go "WOW". When I showed them the square footage…We don’t have that conception in west Volusia; the biggest building we have holds 150. You’re talking about thousands.

MR. LEWIS – I think it’s important to have open dialogue like this, whether the press is here or not, we all live in the same county. We have varying interests, but we want to bolster each other and work together to make this the best county we can. I don’t like to see it get separated, it’s one county with diverse interests. Whatever we can do to help one another should be done; and I think this convention center has served our county very well.

STUART ARP – Many of our employees that work here live in Deltona and Deland.

JOHN MASIARCZYK – Sanford is a major concern to us about what they are doing on the lakefront. We have problems with our people to the south who want nothing done on the lakefront, and they are continually building and growing. Our people flood to the west now, it’s hard to get them to go east, so they are going to have less and less of an impact or use of the Ocean Center if Sanford does carry off what they want to do. In fact, you’re going to see our side of the county spending even more time going west, instead of easterly, which helps the county.

Adjournment

The meeting was adjourned at 10:52 a.m.

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