The Editor
The Anguillian
Dear Sir
“Anguilla benefits from STEP Conference”
I write with regards to the aforementioned titled article which appeared in the 8th May 2015 edition of your newspaper. In the article, you wrote as follows: “A major financial event called Anguilla STEP Conference 2015, the island’s first ever such activity, was for some reason held in neighbouring Dutch Sint Maarten……but Anguilla is still to gain some resulting benefits.”
Permit me an opportunity to correct the record here by writing this letter and asking that you published it soonest. Firstly, the conference held recently was the 2015 STEP Caribbean Conference as was announced in January 2015 at a function held at da’Vida to which your newspaper was invited.
Secondly, and more importantly, I wish to address the issue as to why the conference was held in Sint Maarten. Despite our many efforts at addressing this matter, it still appears to be a cause of concern for some members of the public.
In doing so, I will quote extensively from a letter I wrote, dated the 5th February 2015, to Ms. Gilda Samuels and Mrs. Candis Niles of the Anguilla Hotel and Tourism Association and the Anguilla Tourist Board, respectively, after some members of the former body raised similar concerns.
“The STEP Caribbean Conference is organised by a committee comprised of representatives from all the STEP Branches/Chapters in the region. You may review the website: www.stepcaribbeanconference.com to ascertain the members of this committee. The Conference is awarded to Branches/Chapters annually based on a competitive bid process. STEP Anguilla was awarded the Conference in October 2013 for staging in 2015.
“In assessing bids, the Committee examines many criteria. For purposes of this letter, I wish to discuss the two salient ones which I believe are important to assist your members to understand the decision to stage the Conference in Sint Maarten. Firstly, the venue or jurisdiction in which the Conference is to be held must have a hotel which can house at least 250 delegates, committee members, speakers, guests and media personnel, in one physical space. This means that the Conference cannot be spread out amongst various hotel properties. Secondly, the hotel must have conference facilities with the requisite support facilities to house said number of delegates and at least three break-out rooms which must be present and functional at the same time.
“When taken together, given the available properties on Anguilla, it is clear that none would satisfy these criteria.
“The second criterion is airlift. I don’t think I need to explain to you the difficulties of this. However, even if airlift weren’t an issue, the lack of appropriate, for purposes of this event only, hotel facilities means that staging it on Anguilla will never be feasible until of course, our tourism plant allows for this.”
I do hope that this clarifies this matter and I would like to thank you for your extensive coverage of the event on the 3rd May 2015 which indeed exposed the island to our delegates and was well received and enjoyed by all.
Yours faithfully
Carlyle K Rogers
Chairman, STEP Anguilla and 2015 STEP Caribbean Conference
