(Updated)
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/2801141/posts
“Cain Accuser’s Lawyer Said Case “Leaked to Politico by a Board Member of Natl Restaurant Assoc”
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2801725/posts
A friend of the Cain campaign believes a National Restaurant Association (NRA) employee out of the Chicago office leaked the story to the Perry campaign via information and influence from Mayor Rahm Emanuel’s office.
Possible tie-ins between Chris Wilson (Wilson Research Strategies, WRS), The National Restaurant Association (NRA), Former NRA Chair Ed Tinsley, Rahm Emanual, etc.
Wiki:
(Chris) Wilson served as Executive Director of the Republican Party of Texas when President George W. Bush was governor, working directly for Karl Rove, and following Karen Hughes when she left the Party to join the campaign.
Wilson served as Global Director of Research for Weber Shandwick from 1999 - 2001. He started his own firm, Wilson Research Strategies, in 1998.
http://www.bizjournals.com/washington/stories/2002/02/25/daily7.html
Opinion researcher Wilson rings up 411
Washington Business Journal
Date: Monday, February 25, 2002, 4:26pm EST
Wilson Research Strategies said Monday that it acquired 411 Communications, another Washington area opinion research firm.
Financial details of the deal were not disclosed, but Chris Wilson, WRS’s president ...
(snip)
WRS has six principals and was relaunched as a subsidiary of McLean, Va.-based Qorvis Communications in August. About 30 to 40 percent of the company’s work is political and its biggest clients include Pfizer, Saudi Arabia and the National Restaurant Association.
(snip)
City strikes deal to keep restaurant show
Financial package worth $2 million comes after group reschedules to avoid NATO, G-8 summits
July 27, 2011|By Kathy Bergen, Tribune reporter
The National Restaurant Association announced Tuesday it will keep its show in Chicago next year, but it will move the dates to avoid overlap with the NATO and G-8 summits.
The high-profile show will be held May 5-8, rather than May 19-22, at McCormick Place, where it has been a fixture since 1950.
The decision was made after Chicago came forward with a one-time financial package aimed at reducing some losses that could occur due to the schedule change. The association, the city’s convention bureau and the mayor’s office declined to discuss the specifics of the deal.
The package is worth about $2 million and includes public and private funding sources, according to sources close to the deal. That total includes noncash items, such as marketing and attendance-building services that the bureau often provides to trade shows, sources said.
(snip)
Mary Pat Heftman, executive vice president of convention for the restaurant association, said Mayor Rahm Emanuel and the convention bureau “worked to mitigate potential losses” and pledged to help drive attendance on the new dates.
Emanuel helped to bring NATO and the leading industrial nations to Chicago using his influence as a former White House chief of staff, and he found himself scrambling to ease the resulting timing conflict.
Losing the restaurant show, even for one year, would have been a public relations nightmare for the city, which is racing to recover from a federal court ruling tossing out labor-rule changes aimed at reducing exhibitors’ costs.
The restaurant show is one of the city’s largest, this year drawing 58,000 attendees who packed hotels and restaurants, and generated an estimated $93.3 million in spending. It typically is the big game in town during its run.
(snip)
http://disclosures.house.gov/lc/lcxmlrelease/2008/MM/700070312.xml
#72.
Contribution Type:
FECA
Contributor Name:
National Restaurant Association PAC
Honoree:
Edward R. Tinsley, III
Amount:
$200,000.00
Date:
3/11/2008
Payee:
Wilson Research Strategies
http://watchdog.net/lob/c/700070312
Lobbyist ID Mr. John Gay
http://www.nrn.com/article/nra-texas-gov-perry-push-ethanol-waiver
NRA, Texas Gov. Perry push for ethanol waiver
June 24, 2008
WASHINGTON National Restaurant Association officials and other food industry representatives concerned about ethanol-related food inflation joined Texas Gov. Rick Perry here Tuesday to call on the Environmental Protection Agency to approve his request for a waiver of the Renewable Fuels Standard, or RFS.
Perry, backed by the NRA and other members of the recently formed Coalition for Balanced Food and Fuel, told an audience at the National Press Club that a reduction of this year’s RFS mandate would ease skyrocketing corn prices that have hurt his state’s livestock and poultry industries. Perry in April petitioned the EPA to cut the mandate from 9 billion to 4.5 billion gallons of ethanol blended into the nation’s fuel supply.
John Gay, the NRA’s senior vice president of government affairs and public policy ...
(snip)
wiki:
Dawn Sweeney is President and CEO of the National Restaurant Association[5]. The 2009-2010 Chairman of the Board is Michael Gibbons of Mainstreet Ventures.[6] Recent association chairs included Edward R. Tinsley of New Mexico, the franchisor of K-Bob’s Steakhouse restaurant chain, who served from 2006-2007.[7]
TINSLEY, EDWARD ROY MR III
SANTA FE,NM 87506 TINSLEY HOSPITALITY GROUP L.L.C./RE 8/30/11 $2,500 Perry, Rick (R)
Restaurant Show May Leave Chicago Over Scheduling Conflict
###
A spat has erupted between Mayor Rahm Emanuel and the head of the National Restaurant Association over the dates of the annual event, which will overlap with the NATO and G8 Summit.
*snip*
Crain’s Chicago Business is quoting sources as saying Mayor Emanuel and Mary Pat Heftman, the head of the show had a contentious meeting recently as city officials want the dates for the restaurant show to be moved to an earlier timeframe in May. The show generates more than $100 million for the Chicago economy...
http://chicago.cbslocal.com/2011/07/08/restaurant-show-may-leave-chicago-over-scheduling-conflict/
~~~~
Sweets Expo Switches Dates To Avoid G8 Clash
###
Looks like Mayor Rahm Emanuel avoided another potential roadblock ahead of next year’s Global G8 and NATO Summit in Chicago.
The National Confectioners Association announced it will change the dates of its popular Sweets and Snacks Expo at McCormick Place, according to Crain’s Chicago Business. The expo will be held May 8-10 instead of May 22-24 to avoid clashing with the summit’s schedule.
In July, Chicago risked losing the National Restaurant Association’s 2012 Restaurant Show because of the G8/NATO summit.
*snip*
“This will give the industry the best opportunity for a productive and enjoyable show,” said NRA President and CEO Dawn Sweeney. “The NRA’s primary goal is provide our exhibitors and attendees an environment that is conducive to business.”
~~~~~~~~~~~
McCormick Place union deal reap rewards: Trade show, hotel work
###
*snip*
Solar Power International had initially agreed to bring its 27,000 attendees and $80 million in “economic activity” to Chicago for the first time in 2013 after the Legislature dictated cost-saving work-rule changes last year.
When two unions challenged that mandate and a federal judge agreed, Solar Power International put its plans on hold while McCormick Place officials sought those same changes at the bargaining table.
Last week, the Teamsters and Carpenters Unions signed on the dotted line.
*snip*
At a McCormick Place news conference Friday, Mayor Rahm Emanuel touted both developments as proof that the Teamsters and Carpenters made the “right choice for their members.”
“While you’re negotiating, you look at how you’re lowering costs [and] what they’re giving up,” Emanuel said.
“Today, we’re showing them what the opportunity is when you make those agreements — all the job growth, job creation and economic opportunity it creates for them, their families and the city of Chicago.”
The mayor added, “It shows that, if we all give a little, we all will win a lot. And the only people [who] won’t win today will be Las Vegas and Orlando. My thoughts and prayers are with them because I want Chicago to win and that’s what I care about.”
The union concessions agreed to last week will allow the McPier Authority to create an “exhibitors bill of rights” that lets show managers and exhibitors set up their own booths with simple tools.
*snip*
The concessions also salvaged the Housewares Show, the National Restaurant Association, the Surgeons and Fabtech, officials said.
~~~~
You can bet these conventions mean BILLIONS .. to the unions, Chicago Way players and corruption networks, Chicago coffers, etc.
You can also bet there was no way Emanuel would have a light touch in negotiations. Probably laid down Rahm’s Law .. hard line ..whatever he had to do to use to keep these groups from going to Vegas or Orlando with their billions.
And, just with the sheer scope of the size and power of the huge NRA (restaurant assoc), he would know the principals of that group, as they’re also a political factor, a lobbying group with millions of members and $$$.