At the same time, if I can pull this off at all, it will be on a shoestring budget. I can’t afford to be hopping a jet every week to check out hotels and such. At least for now, any conference I’m organizing will need to be pretty much in my backyard. It’s possible that San Antonio, Houston, or even DFW would be a bit cheaper, but my research thus far doesn’t suggest that it’s enough to make it worth my time to make those drives frequently. Plus, none of those cities has a strong reputation for tolerating differences- Austin does.

This is important in a number of ways. For instance, many shamans, spiritworkers, and mystics possess a gender identity that is not recognized by a substantial portion of the US population. Many Austin businesses (though certainly not all) offer non-gendered restrooms and/or try hard to be conscientious of gender identity.

Furthermore, many of these leaders are also subject to significant restrictions regarding diet, dress, and the like. Others carry physical scars and ailments that require special accommodation to prevent extreme discomfort and suffering. Holding the conference in a major city makes it easier to find the goods and services (and service providers) necessary to ease this burden.

For instance, I can easily source vegan, gluten-free, organic, and/or humanely-pastured food from several different vendors. Austin might be Whole Foods’ headquarters city, but we have lots of other places, large and small.

I am fully confident that this city can comfortably support a polytheist leadership conference.

Of course, being in Texas, the season is important. March is a beautiful time of year, weather-wise, but that’s when SXSW happens… good luck booking a flight or a hotel during that! March is also during the school year, and many members of our target audience are academics- teachers, professors, graduate students, and such.

For that reason, the 2014 PLC was held in July- a perfectly reasonable time to visit New York state. Austin, however, topped out around 104°F (40°C) today. Sure, there’s a hemisphere-wide heat wave going on right now, but temperatures in the high 90s are not unusual here in summer, or late spring and autumn for that matter.

While most of the conference will be indoors (though it would be nice to have some outdoor events), we have to consider the possibility that some attendees will want to sleep outdoors or in their vehicles either because of religious strictures or to save money. This is not unprecedented, so I need to take it into consideration.

Another important transportation-related consideration is vehicle access and mass transit.

Being in Texas, many venues have plenty of parking. If you’re not sure what I mean by this state’s love of the automobile, I encourage you to visit the Buc-ee’s convenience store in New Braunfels, about 45 minutes south of Austin.

On the other hand, no city in Texas has particularly great public transit. Austin’s is improving, but I will need to plan carefully around the available bus routes to make sure that non-driving guests can get from the airport, Amtrak, and Greyhound stations to the conference venue.

-In Deos Confidimus

The post Host City Considerations appeared first on Hearthingstone.

Hearthingstone is intended to serve a small subset of the polytheist populace- namely those in (or being groomed for) positions of responsibility and service to some tradition and/or community.

This immediately shrinks the size of facility down. Even if Hearthingstone grows miraculously large, we will probably never need hotel rooms and seating for 50,000 people. This might seem obvious, but if I were planning a media fandom event I’d have to consider such a possibility.

I can’t find my materials from the 2014 PLC in Fishkill, but I recall the attendance being around 50 or so. It might have been larger, but I’m pretty sure there were less than 100 attendees. Once I can give this conference a little more life of its own, I’ll ask the organizers if they recall.

My hope is the have between 100 and 200 attendees for the first Hearthingstone. This will require more in-depth outreach to bring in leaders from local and regional pockets who aren’t necessarily connected to the same networks as the folks at the 2014 PLC. In picking a venue, I’d also like to be able to roughly double that size over time without having to change locations.

This brings up another very important issue- transportation. In order to bring in attendees from around the nation (and world), good transportation is a must. I’ll explore host city considerations in another post, but figuring out how to get people to the conference will consume a considerable amount of time.

As far as programming, I’m thinking that a main “stage” and 2-3 smaller sessions per block will provide a good variety of options without spreading people out too much. Given that there are several “big” categories of topics and nearly endless subcategories of each, this should also help ensure that nearly every block has a session appropriate to any given attendee.

Why is this important?

Hearthingstone is asking folks to expend considerable time, effort, and money to attend- as host, I owe them my best effort to make sure they feel it’s worth the trouble. The first time someone attends a conference and rubs shoulders with a famous blogger or author, that’s usually a big deal to them. The novelty wears off, though- it’s the general quality of programming that enables a conference to attract people again and again.

If we are going to be successful in building up the strength of polytheism in the world, we need people coming back.

That’s enough for one night’s noodling. Keep an eye out for more detailed posts in the coming days and weeks.

-In Deos Confidimus

The post Planning Begins… appeared first on Hearthingstone.