As a member of the Convention Committee, I’d like to say first of all, thanks to SLEC for your confidence in us in doing the research and communication required to give LPTexas the best possible options for an amazing 2024 State Convention!
We considered many factors in narrowing our proposals down to the three that have been presented to SLEC. Among them were definitely the overall monetary costs of putting on the convention and the travel and related costs of delegates, but quite honestly, from the standpoint of a political party that is trying to grow and reach the most voters in Texas to make both a legislative and electoral impact, those, while important, were not the biggest concerns. We, as a committee, and as a party, have to think about our goals and objectives and what is best for accomplishing those, not just what is best for us as party activists.
We need a 2024 convention that makes an impact, on both the community we choose for our venue, but also voters and potential allies for liberty across our great state.
In 2020, McAllen was chosen as the host city, and even though I was not a part of SLEC or convention selection process at that time, I can only conclude that outreach to the fertile voter ground of South Texas was a large part of the reason for that selection. As you all know, circumstances forced us to move the convention to Big Spring, and South Texas lost its convention opportunity. Our convention committee was almost entirely represented by people from the Houston and Dallas/Fort Worth areas, which is why I felt the need to speak up for South Texas and consider convention venues in that area, and came up with Corpus Christi as a compromise, which is not as far South as McAllen, but is strategically located as a gateway to points farther South, but also on the beautiful Gulf Coast, and still accessible to other regions of the state.
San Antonio meets some of the same requirements, from its Southwest location, to its rich cultural heritage, and opportunities for outreach to a majority Hispanic community. San Antonio and Bexar county is one of the largest and fastest growing affiliates in LPTexas and combined with a top notch venue located in the fast growing Northwest, I have no doubt we could pull off a stellar convention there. Though I was in the minority of the committee that voted for Corpus, not San Antonio, I have no doubt that all factors were considered before the majority voted to recommend it, including the costs, which at the time we voted Friday night, were quite close to the numbers given for the Houston venue.
I’ll be back tomorrow with more information about why I recommend that SLEC vote for Corpus Christi, but I’ll wrap up this long post by saying a thank you to Jodi, our Chair, for her hard work in making many phone calls and emails with multiple venues, as well as furiously compiling the data on the fly for us to have the most updated information on which to make an informed vote. And thank you to Rudy, our Secretary, for his diligence in recording everything, and the other members of our committee - Billy, Jennifer, Hannah, and Jaden, for all their help and hard work as well. We had some spirited meetings, we had some laughs, and we took seriously our responsibility to find the best options possible for SLEC to approve for our best convention yet in 2024!
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