The Urban League on Thursday affirmed a decision to bring its 2003 national convention to Cincinnati despite calls to avoid the city by boycott organizers.

        President Hugh B. Price and other top officials of the mainstream civil rights organization said they are convinced the city has started reforms to fix police, economic and social gaps in Cincinnati that triggered the April 2001 riots.

Urban League chief executive Sheila Adams with (from left), Lisa Haller, council member Minette Cooper and Mayor Charlie Luken (Michael E. Keating photo) | ZOOM |

        But, Mr. Price added, Cincinnati “has quite a ways to go before it eradicates the inequities besetting African-Americans” and the convention will shine a national spotlight on the city's efforts at police reform, economic opportunity, inclusion and justice.

        Mayor Charlie Luken hailed the decision as a signal that Cincinnati has turned “a very important corner” one year after the start of a downtown boycott that has successfully persuaded several African-American conventions to skip the city.

        “Let's consider this a victory,” Mr. Luken said. “But let's not think the work is done.”

        Nate Livingston, co-chairman of the Coalition for a Just Cincinnati, said his boycott group was “very disappointed” by the news, and would “take the fight to the streets in Avondale” today by staging a protest at the local Urban League office at 10 a.m.

        “We want to try and inform the community that the Urban League has put monetary gain above principle,” he said. Boycott organizers who planned to meet with Mr. Price earlier this week did not return phone calls on Thursday.

        The announcement comes three weeks after Mr. Luken, local Urban League chief executive Sheila Adams and other Cincinnati tourism officials flew to the Urban League's New York offices to meet with Mr. Price and discuss reforms undertaken.

        Mr. Price, who didn't attend Thursday's press conference at Fountain Square, said in a prepared statement that the decision to keep the convention in Cincinnati came after consulting Ms. Adams.

        The meeting will bring 4,000 to 5,000 visitors in August 2003, providing an economic boost of $3.4 million to $4.3 million for downtown shops, restaurants and hotels. The Greater Cincinnati Convention and Visitors Bureau offered undisclosed financial incentives for the Urban League, not uncommon for such a large meeting, said Lisa Haller, the bureau's president.

        The Urban League officially selected Cincinnati for its 2003 convention in February 2001, two months before police fatally shot the unarmed, fleeing 19-year-old Timothy Thomas, triggering four days of rioting. When the boycott was launched a year ago, Urban League officials said they would monitor the city's progress on issues of racial inequity, raising the possibility of a canceled convention.

        Ms. Adams said holding the convention here will bring “economic self-sufficiency” to Cincinnati residents, a fundamental goal of the Urban League.

        “This convention will really bring that platform forward in Cincinnati,” Ms. Adams said.

        Ms. Adams said the group's national meeting will focus on “economic self-sufficiency” and whether the city's reforms will help African-Americans achieve that goal. Conference sessions will examine issues that have dominated discussions of race relations in Cincinnati, including police brutality, the educational gap, economic development and affordable housing house trends. in Cincinnati and other cities.

        Mr. Price added that the Urban League officials will even consult with community leaders, including boycott organizers, as they decide meeting topics, Mr. Price said.

        Bringing a national convention here that is usually held in cities such as Los Angeles and New York is considered a major accomplishment for Ms. Adams.

        “If it were it not for the respect the national Urban League had for Sheila, the decision may have been different,” Mr. Luken said.

        Despite the reforms, it is clear that Mr. Price isn't satisfied with Cincinnati. He singled out the Cincinnati Arts Association's decision to file a lawsuit against boycott organizers as a “strategy of intimidation and hardly worthy of enlightened civic leaders.”

        The arts group sued the Coalition for a Just Cincinnati this year, claiming the boycott group has interfered with legal contracts between the association and performers. High-profile entertainers such as actor-comedian Bill Cosby and trumpeter Wynton Marsalis canceled performances at the request of the coalition.

        In 2003, the Urban the Urban League's top publication, The State of Black America, also will critique Cincinnati's reforms.

        The trip to New York was the latest of several steps Cincinnati tourism leaders have take done to reach out to black convention officials.

        Vice Mayor Alicia Reece and convention bureau chairman Eric Kearney in May met with a group of black meeting planners in Kansas City, Mo., and the convention bureau paid for a one-page advertisement in a trade magazine, Black Meetings & Tourism, catering to African-American meeting planners.

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