TO:
Oscar Reyna, President
Texas Association of Collegiate Registrars and Admissions Officers
FROM:
Berri O’Neal, Chair
Conference Site Selection Committee
DATE:
November 5, 2013
The 2012-2013 Conference Site Selection Committee had the responsibility of selecting the Conference Site for
the 2015 TACRAO Conference. In addition, the Conference Site Selection Committee also worked with Experient
and Debbie Borel-Ploeger, TACRAO’s Experient representative, to negotiate the site for the TACRAO Summer
Meetings.
The Conference Site Selection Committee is comprised of:
Bobbye Fry, University of Incarnate Word
Melissa Gallien, Lamar University
Berri O’Neal, Universities Center at Dallas
The Committee met at the 2012 Conference in Dallas at the Sheraton and agreed that possible sites for the 2015
Conference included Houston, Corpus Christi, Padre Island and San Marcos. After pursuing San Marcos, Debbie
notified the Committee that San Marcos would not bid on the conference, as there are insufficient rooms at
hotels in the city. Meeting rooms are sufficient, but overflow hotels to the conference hotel are not in walking
distance, and they did not have shuttle opportunities for the conference attendees. At the same time, the
Committee pursued South Padre Island as a possibility as the conference site. There are two main hotels that
could hold a TACRAO Conference, but between the two hotels, there was not enough nightly capacity for the
number of conference attendees who could possibly attend a conference in 2015. The meeting room capacity was
860, which is also a tight projection for this Committee to make, based on the growing attendance during the past
few years’ conferences, and knowing that 2015 might be a year where attendance would still be increasing. In
addition, as the Committee members attempted to book our trip to South Padre Island, none of us could find
flight arrangements that made travel conducive to arriving for a day visit. It instead required a flight into Corpus
Christi and then a drive to the Island. This would not work for a conference, to have that many arrivals and not
enough rental cars or transportation after the flight portion of the trip. In addition, if flights/travel were a
deterrent or a hurdle to attendance, then the location could hurt the conference’s attendance in the long run.
Thus, after those two cities were ruled out, we still wished to visit both Austin and Houston, based on the last
times that those cities were chosen to host the Annual Conference. In addition, the Committee had been
contacted by the City of Corpus Christi and the Omni Hotel in Corpus Christi for consideration as a conference site.
With that in mind, the Committee chose to also travel to Corpus Christi for a site visit.
After the three site visits to Corpus Christi in May, Austin in June and Houston in July, the Committee had a
conference call meeting on July 31, 2013. The four options were compared – Hyatt Regency Houston, the Westin
Galleria – Houston, the Renaissance Hotel – Austin, and the Omni in Corpus Christi. Various aspects of the
Conference and logistics were compared and discussed. The decision to wait for Corpus Christi to be the
Conference Site again was made, simply because of the desire to fairly rotate the Annual Conference around the
state. Since Corpus Christi was the host for the 2008 Conference, and other cities had not been utilized since
2005, 2006, etc., we felt we must choose other cities prior to Corpus Christi. Corpus Christi had incredible facilities
and an excellent relationship between the host hotel and the Conference Center. Corpus Christi will serve
TACRAO well, when chosen to host again in the future.
The Renaissance Hotel, Austin also had impeccable services, with an excellent location to nearby shopping and
restaurants. The hotel will be able to fulfill the organization’s needs, with large meeting rooms, an excellent space
for exhibitors, large and small break-out sessions, recently renovated guest rooms and restaurants. The deciding
factor was simply because the Committee felt that with the 2011 Annual Conference being held in San Antonio
and SACRAO 2012 held in San Antonio as well, that resources for Local Arrangements Committee members would
be low, and it would be unfair to rotate back to that region of the state so quickly, without an opportunity for
those members to have several years before hosting again.
In Houston, the Committee visited two hotels over a period of two days in July 2013. The Westin Galleria and the
Houston Hyatt Regency were both considered. The Committee determined that although there were many pros
to the Westin Galleria site, the Committee also felt that the location of the Westin Galleria being attached to a
mall, the Conference might suffer in attendance at sessions, etc. with distractions. The Hyatt Regency Houston
served as the host for the 2005 TACRAO Annual Conference, and due to Hurricane Ike, the hotel was damaged
and has recently completed a major renovation project. The guest rooms and meeting rooms have all been
completely renovated and remodeled. The Hyatt Regency Manager, staff, our Account Executive and the City of
Houston staff were exceptional hosts and advocates for their city. They are eager to host TACRAO, and they
worked to answer all questions from the Committee, including arrangements with airport transportation, local
downtown transportation and restaurant and shopping options. Allison Dragon, Regional Manager of
Undergraduate Admissions, Texas Tech University, Houston Campus, graciously accepted the position as Local
Arrangements Chair for the 2015 Conference. We feel with the cooperation of the City of Houston, the Hyatt
Regency Houston and an energetic LAC Chair, the Conference Site Selection Committee is confident that the 2015
TACRAO Annual Conference, slated for November 7-11, 2015 will be a successful event for our organization.
Thank you for allowing us to work on this Committee on behalf of our organization. The members of the
Committee were thorough with all research and questions, site visits and inquiries, and it was an honor to work
this year with Bobbye Fry and Melissa Gallien, who give so much to our organization.
Respectfully Submitted,
Berri O’Neal