MISSOURI BREAKS:

COGIC convention to stay in St. Louis through 2019.

The annual Church of God in Christ Holy Convocation won’t be coming home to Memphis any time soon.

The Memphis-based African-American Pentecostal denomination said it has signed a new three-year agreement to keep the convention in St. Louis through 2019.

The convention was held in Memphis from 1907 through 2009. It was Memphis’ largest convention with more than 30,000 delegates until it moved to St. Louis in 2010, lured by a better deal on hotels and larger convention facilities.

Memphis had made a bid to bring the convention back to Memphis for 2017, 2018 and 2019, after COGIC’s current agreement with St. Louis ends.

But the city fell short because it hasn’t addressed the limitations of the convention center and surrounding hotel market, an official said.

The Memphis Convention & Visitors Bureau goes after COGIC events including the Holy Convocation “because we want them to know we want them back,” vice president of marketing and communications Regena Bearden said.

COGIC left because “they outgrew our buildings, and because of the shortage of hotel rooms that we have near our convention center,” Bearden said. “Nothing has changed on that.”

“We’re always going to be watching all of their business and trying to bid on it, but obviously they still can’t look at us for the big convocation meeting because we just haven’t changed in size and hotel rooms,” Bearden said.

Memphis has had success booking smaller COGIC events, such as a weeklong leadership conference in April that draws 1,000 to 1,500.

One of the city’s bigger conventions this year will be the National Baptist Convention USA Inc.’s Annual Session. It is scheduled to bring in 20,000-

plus delegates Sept. 7-11, Bearden said.

Memphis is inching toward addressing the hotel room issue, with the planned One Beale project including a 255-room, fullservice hotel with meeting facilities. But most of the hotel projects currently in the pipeline for Downtown are smaller properties not likely to help attract new convention and meetings business, bureau officials say.

Meanwhile, the bureau is preparing to unveil a $50 million to $60 million plan to upgrade the convention center’s exhibit halls and support facilities, which are more than 40 years old.

COGIC’s announcement laid to rest reports that church leaders weren’t happy with the host city or last summer’s racial unrest in the St. Louis suburb of Ferguson.

Presiding Bishop Charles E. Blake Sr. wrote to Missouri’s governor last fall urging justice and “systemic changes” in response to the killing of black teenager Michael Brown by a white Ferguson police officer.

COGIC said the convention has pumped $150 million into the St. Louis area economy over five years.

In a news release on COGIC’s website, Blake said, “The Church of God in Christ Holy Convocation is returning to St. Louis, Missouri, and the delegates and leaders of our denomination are excited. St. Louis has been the new home for our largest convention for five years now, and the hospitality that we have received while here has been great.”

Keith Kershaw, COGIC director for the Office of Convention Planning said, “We have chosen to return to St. Louis through 2019 because we like St. Louis and from every indication, the city likes that we are a part of its convention schedule. As one of the largest, if not the largest convention (i.e. 2010-2013), St. Louis fits our needs and has proven to be a great match.”