Monterey offers large concessions to groups displaced by Conference Center delays.

It’s only the second year of the Organic Produce Summit, but it’s already a “can’t miss” event, according to the Organic Trade Association. Expecting to host 1,200 people at this year’s event July 12-13 at the Monterey Conference Center, an event organizer, Wolfgang Jilka of ConferenceDirect, was already worried back in January.

“Should [Organic Produce Summit] be concerned?” Jilka wrote in a Jan. 20 email to Nancy Williams, the conference center’s director of sales and marketing, after seeing a news story about construction delays.

In a Feb. 22 email, Matt Seeley, summit founder, chimed in: “The lack of clarity and information about the updated construction timeline… and the impact on our event is verytroubling and worrisome.”

The anxiety of conference organizers like Jilka and Seeley jumps out upon reviewing emails sent to Monterey Conference Center staff from January through early April.

Those emails, obtained through a Public Records Act request, also show conference center staff attempting to allay organizers’ fears.

“I do not think there is any cause for concern,” Williams replied to Jilka.

The last advertised completion date was March 24. The current expected completion date, according to Assistant City Manager Hans Uslar: Sept. 21.

At least 18 groups slated to use the conference center from March through September have had to reschedule or shift to other venues around the city, Williams says. Groups have also utilized the Golden State Theatre, Del Monte Aviation at the Monterey Municipal Airport and tents erected on Custom House Plaza and nearby parking lots.

To help groups keep their conferences in Monterey, city officials are offering to pay the extra expenses for switching venues. Williams says the total cost to support those 18 groups is unknown. Those expenses, she says, are being covered by damages being paid by the project contractor, Stronghold Engineering, which has been paying $10,000 a day since March 24. (Agreements between the city of Monterey and Stronghold are currently being litigated; the original contract specified a $10,000-a-day penalty for missing the construction deadline.)

“We think it’s smart to help these conferences stay in Monterey, because it impacts not only the hotels related to those groups, but also to help our local merchants,” Williams says.

For the Organic Produce Summit, the city agreed to pay up to $100,000 for tents, shuttle buses and other costs, according to the email exchange.

Williams says that cost may come down, because she’s in negotiations with tent suppliers attempting to get a discount since the city is generating so much business.

Seeley wrote in an email that the summit expects to lose “upwards of $250,000 in attendance revenue,” due to a smaller capacity – 900 attendees versus 1,200 that would have fit in the conference center.

The city is also offering reduced rates or complimentary conference space for future events, “to make groups whole as much as we can,” Williams says, “[and] so they know they’re loved and we want them back in Monterey.”