Pubdate: Sun, 28 Dec 2014
Source: Denver Post (CO)
Copyright: 2014 The Denver Post Corp
Contact:  http://www.denverpost.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/122
Author: Steve Raabe

CONVENTIONS VIEW LEGAL DEVELOPMENTS AS USEFUL TOPIC FOR PANEL DISCUSSIONS

Delegates to national conventions in Colorado are well aware of legal 
retail marijuana, and not just because they might have slipped in a 
visit to a dispensary.

Some conventions have used Colorado's cannabis laws to incorporate 
working panels on the ways legal pot can affect their business sectors.

"The legality of marijuana certainly impacts our industry," said 
Stuart Ruff, director of meetings and events for the Risk and 
Insurance Management Society, which brought 9,700 attendees to Denver 
in April. "There are a lot of misperceptions about the (Colorado) 
law, and we want our members to be educated."

After recreational cannabis sales became legal Jan. 1, RIMS decided 
to hold a convention session entitled, "How Will the Legalization of 
Marijuana Affect Your Employment Policies?"

"From my perspective, I look at it as an opportunity," said Fred 
Droz, a meeting planner who is coordinating the Communications 
Leadership Exchange convention in Denver in April. "The group prides 
itself in addressing topics that deal with strategic thinking, so we 
will have a panel that will give different perspectives on legal marijuana."

Convention locations typically are selected far in advance of the 
events themselves, sometimes as long as 10 years earlier. That means 
almost all major meetings taking place in Colorado for the next few 
years were planned well before Amendment 64 was approved by Colorado 
voters in November 2012.

Visit Denver, the city's convention and visitors bureau, logged 
429,210 convention delegates through the end of December, compared 
with 385,292 in 2013. Bookings for 2015 and 2016 are on pace to 
continue the same trend, bureau spokesman Rich Grant said.

For future bookings, fallout from legal marijuana has been a complete 
non-factor, Visit Denver CEO Richard Scharf said.

"People are more inclined to joke about it anymore than to express 
any concerns," he said. "It's been pretty immaterial from either a 
positive or negative standpoint."

Scharf said officials of Visit Denver, the city government and 
organizations such as the Downtown Denver Partnership have worked 
hard to educate visitors and convention delegates on the terms of 
Colorado's cannabis laws, including where it can and cannot be consumed.

Ruff of RIMS said the shock value and comedic aspects have dissipated.

The group's convention delegates "are all college-educated people," 
he said. "They lived in dorms once."
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MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom