Twenty-three years later, the City Center has consistently grown and is looking at its second or third best year right now.

Mark Baker, president of the City Center, said he is projecting about 180 event days at the center by the end of the month.

Event days are the days that the center is used for a party, trade show or consumer show; it does not include any of the setup days for an event. Baker said if an event ends on a Thursday evening, the staff can set up for a new event coming in Friday.

Last year there were 166 event days, and Baker said they are already ahead of that number.

“That speaks well in the value of our downtown, hotels and the center,” Baker said. “The more people that are in the community, the better it is for the downtown.”

He said it is important to the City Center to have an alive, vibrant business district.

Baker said the center has hosted more entertainment and dinner events this year than years past.

This has been the trend for the last three or four years with corporate and local groups having holiday parties, peer-networking, moral building or specialty parties there.

“It is an anchor of our December business,” Baker said. “It is a nice piece of business for us to have and it compliments our bread and butter events.”

He said the center is a product in the making regarding specialty parties, but with a variety of caters and other attractive aspects of the center, the demand is becoming greater. He gave the Bartender’s Ball and the Pink Ball as two examples for specialty events.

The ceiling height gives the clients a large, open venue that they can decorate in a theme or have the ability to have a bandstand stage for performances.

Baker said with the center growing and reaching new clients each year, the need for the expansion is great.

He said the process is slow, but are consistently moving forward. He said they are working with the architect with design scenarios for the build-out of the building and that the team is in place.

All that is left is making sure all the permits are in order and the funding is in place.

He said by the time the groundbreaking occurs, half the work is already over regarding the planning stages for the expansion.

“The expansion will meet the needs of perspective clients and keep our current client base,” Baker said. “We have to make sure everything is in order to take the next step.”

He said everyone is on board with the expansion – the city government, hotels, downtown businesses and state government.

“We are hoping by mid-2008 to be ready to take action for a ground-breaking,” he said.