[Board] Fwd: Evergreen Conference Cancellation / Renegotiation

[Terran McCanna]

Good morning, I sought out Beverly Arnold's advice (the Director of
Conference and Meeting Services for the Board of Regents of the University
System of Georgia) and the message below is the follow up which summarizes
what we discussed. She will be bringing in their contract expert, Christine
Campbell, who has extensive experience in conference contract negotiations,
to reach out to the hotel.

Please let me know if you have any further questions at this time. I will
be sending out a message to the Evergreen list and to all attendees shortly.



Terran McCanna, PINES Program Manager
------------------------------

Georgia Public Library Service | University System of Georgia

2872 Woodcock Blvd, Suite 250 l Atlanta, GA 30341

(404) 235-7138 | tmccanna at georgialibraries.org

http://help.georgialibraries.org | help at help.georgialibraries.org

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---------- Forwarded message ---------
From: Terran McCanna <tmccanna at georgialibraries.org>
Date: Fri, Mar 13, 2020 at 10:35 AM
Subject: Evergreen Conference Cancellation / Renegotiation
To: Beverly Arnold <beverly.arnold at usg.edu>, <Sherea.Frazer at usg.edu>


Hello Beverly and Sherea,

As we discussed on our call this morning, the Evergreen Conference
Committee, The Evergreen Project Board, and MOBIUS (the contract signatory
for the conference) agree that due to the serious nature of the COVID-19
pandemic, we must cancel this year's Evergreen Conference.

In addition to our duty as responsible citizens, most of the attendees of
this conference are government employees who have received directives this
week to cancel all non-essential travel, so even if we were to attempt to
continue with the conference, we would have negligible attendance.

However, The Evergreen Project does not have the funds to cover the
contract cancellation fee of approximately $125K (the organization has
under $40K in assets). MOBIUS is the conference insurance holder (through
Hartford) but have been informed by Hartford that the pandemic does not
constitute an "act of god" but rather a "communicable disease" which is not
covered by the insurance. We are hopeful that the hotel will be willing to
waive the cancellation costs if we agree to hold the conference there in
2022. (We cannot schedule it for 2021, as we already have a contract to
hold the 2021 conference in Missouri.)

Once this year's conference is cancelled, we will need to refund attendee
and exhibitor fees, minus the merchant funds (which we will pay out of The
Evergreen Project's funds).

I am attaching the hotel and AV contracts here for easy access. It is my
understanding that we can cancel the AV contract with no fee if we cancel
it prior to March 20th.

Thank you for assistance with this process,
Terran McCanna / The Evergreen Conference Committee


Terran McCanna, PINES Program Manager
------------------------------

Georgia Public Library Service | University System of Georgia

2872 Woodcock Blvd, Suite 250 l Atlanta, GA 30341

(404) 235-7138 | tmccanna at georgialibraries.org

http://help.georgialibraries.org | help at help.georgialibraries.org

<https://www.facebook.com/georgialibraries>
<https://www.twitter.com/georgialibs>

Join our email list <http://georgialibraries.org> for stories of Georgia
libraries making an impact in our communities.
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