The process for site selection should begin as soon as possible, preferable at least 1 year out. Note however that some colleges struggle to have their calendars ready a year in advance and may not be able to commit on that timeline.
STEPS for local group:
1- Inform AVP-USA Conference committee of your interest and which year
2-Begin looking at sites that might work for an AVP-USA Gathering Keep in mind: Walkability of the campus, distance from transportation, price, size, etc. Select a couple properties which your local committee thinks will fill the bill and send the information relating them to the site requirements to the AVPUSA Conference Committee for discussion with you and review.
CAUTION: Be sure to check with the National Conference Committee on need for space, before or after, the conference so that can be negotiated. Conference Committee can help you with a check-list of needed items to include.
3-Once both the local and the national committees agree ask the property for a contract. You do not need to give them your contract checklist at this point as they each have different legal departments and will send you what their usual contract.
4- Upon receiving a contract check it over yourselves and then consult with National Conference Committee assuring the committee has copy to review.
5- When you receive the reviewed contract back from national, then call the college representative and go over the points of challenge for AVP. Some people prefer to do this in writing, but often a better response comes in person and you get an idea on how workable the site is.
6- After this conversation, write up a summary of what you agreed upon and copy it to national and the College representative.
7- Once the contract is finalized, it needs to be reviewed one last time by the national conference committee and then sent on to AVPUSA President to sign.
8-Calendar the list of payments and counts required by the site and be sure to meet their deadlines, giving the Treasurer enough time to get that payment done. The final contract should be sent to the AVP-USA Treasurer, AVP-USA President, and the AVP-USA Conference Committee.
9- Insurance will be taken care of by the Conference Committee and the Finance Committee in coordination with the college representative. The local site coordinator will be involved in these discussions, but is not required to seek insurance independently.
Contract communication
The detail that needs to be examined in dealing with a simple site such as the Headlands, which is just dorms and quite stark, are amazing.Keeping track of what was decided was very helpful when the initial contact person left and we lost one of our committee members.
Here is an example of a communication email from 2004:
email sent 10/26/04 after new conference director and staff arrived and wanted to change the contract to be without any of the changes agreed upon but not initialed by their staff before their departure. Spoke to Nan and Natalie about meeting room rates. She is checking.
10/25/04 ph in response to call from Natalie, I called and spoke to Nan about lack of price guarantee and need for hold harmless clause at least an arbitration. Told her I would send them.
Dear Natalie and Nan,
I have spent the afternoon looking over the contract and I do apologize but I have a few more clarifications that we need to make. I would so much prefer a handshake, but if none of us is around next year, someone needs to make sense of what we agreed. I am going to number them so we are able to communicate about them better:
1 - When Toby initially discussed this contract, he understood that by reserving 120 people we reserved the entire facility's beds (and meeting space) and that we essentially have the facility to ourselves. Is this still true? If not, what is the situation? Nonetheless, we still need all the semi-private rooms.
2 - Would you put in writing that the Sunset building is ours to use for the conference at no additional cost. If we fall below 120 people, does this change?
3 - If #1 is now void we will need two additional rooms: Coast (Saturday and Sunday at $500 each day?) and Kestrel (Friday, Saturday, Sunday leaving on Monday a.m. at $750 total?) This needs to be included in the Logistics Worksheet (I am guessing this is where you put things not mentioned in the contract) Regarding Kestrel, what electrical outlets exist there?
4 - We will need to change set up in the Sunset Room upstairs a couple of times. Who handles this and is there an additional charge if you do it?
5 - Do you have high speed internet or telephone access in any of the meeting rooms?
6 - I cannot tell from the Conference extras and Special Services what the fee would be for a weekend. Are these hard and fast per day charges? Do you have any trouble with our bringing in our own (rented) equipment?
7 - A tradition with this conference is to bring in homemade evening snacks for the group. Is this a problem?
8 - I have attached some clauses that we would like to have added to the contract. I understand these need to be put before your Risk management people.
9 - If our volunteer staff of less than 10 wants to come in early in the AM on Friday or spend the night on Thursday, is that a possibility? Would food service be available, thus the standard $67/night or what would be the cost?
10 - Are there other things you normally charge for that I may have overlooked, about which we need to be aware?
11 – Please send us information about the evening programs.
I do apologize for this long list of questions, but I find it so much easier to clarify upfront than end up disagreeing on them later.
Warmly, Pat
Additional Files - Jul 09, 2015 8:46:45 PM