St. Louis submitted its bid on 21 May, along with several other cities.  St. Louis is a strong contender for the Convention, given the region’s central location and unique attributes as a family-friendly and diverse city capable of hosting the 50,000 delegates, press and other visitors in 2012.

If successful, St. Louis will enjoy a significant economic benefit from the Convention.  In 2008, the Convention boosted Denver’s regional economy by $266 million.  For comparison, the 2009 MLB All-Star Game boosted the St. Louis economy by some $60 million.

The DNC’s Technical Advisory Group (TAG) will conduct site visits to each finalist city this summer.

“I’m proud St. Louis got short-listed,” said St. Louis Mayor Francis G. Slay.  “We demonstrated we are a first-class city capable of holding an event of this magnitude.”

The community can follow the St. Louis bid online and sign up to help at stl2012.org, via Twitter @stldnc2012 and on Facebook at facebook.com/stldnc2012.

Conventions are the marquee events of the American political season, attracting thousands of partisans, journalists, guests, staffers, and vendors to their host cities. The Democratic and Republican conventions this summer will each generate roughly $200 million dollars for hotels, taxicabs, restaurants, tourist spots, shopping districts, and taxing districts in Denver and the Twin Cities. Economists debate whether revenues exceed true costs, but civic boosters note that the increased national and international profile of the host cities is likely eclipsed only by hosting an Olympics.

In the earliest days, the major political conventions were held in Eastern cities that were convenient to most of the delegates. As railroads began to stitch to the country together, Midwestern cities became popular hosts. Baltimore hosted most of the early conventions; Chicago has hosted the most conventions. Eight times – five times to St. Louis and three to Kansas City – the Democrats or the Republicans have brought their national conventions to Missouri. The Constitution party’s event for the 2000 elections – which nominated Howard Philips – was the most recent national political convention staged in St. Louis; its 2008 convention was held in Kansas City, nominating Chuck Baldwin.

This year’s Democratic and Republican conventions are a little unusual in that they have been scheduled back-to-back instead of a month apart; and because both parties have nominated tickets that promise to make electoral history of one sort or the other. Voter interest has been high, with Senator Barack Obama’s acceptance speech from a stage set up in Invesco Field drawing 38.4 million television viewers.

This week’s Mini-Poll hopes to quantify your “conventional” opinions while they are still fresh in your mind.

Go to MayorSlay.com to vote.