Amateur and professional photographers are invited to enter the competition, said convention bureau Executive Director Manette Belliveau.

There are two categories -- Oakland Places and Oakland Faces. Entries in Oakland Places can be images of buildings, scenic views, or things (such as trains). Entries in the Oakland Faces category must include people, with accompanying signed model releases.

The Grand Prize winner will be awarded $350 in cash, and category winners will be given prizes of $200 for first place, $75 for second place and $50 for third place, Belliveau said.

"The winning entries will also be considered for selection in upcoming promotional pieces about the city, including our award winning 'Destination Oakland Magazine,'" Belliveau said. "All of the winners will be publicly acknowledged at our Taste of Oakland food and hospitality event in May."

Belliveau and her staff of four recently moved to new offices in the Marriott Hotel/Convention Center complex. "Our street-front office is now on Eleventh Street, next door to the Hertz Car Rental," said Belliveau, who has headed the bureau for 41/2 years.

"Co-locating OCVB and the Oakland Convention Center is going to greatly enhance efforts to attract, promote and service the myriad conventions and special events that are the staple of Oakland's visitor marketing program," said Samee Roberts, the city's director of marketing and liaison with the visitor bureau.

The hotel and convention complex was considered to be the cornerstone of the ambitious downtown City Center Redevelopment District when it first opened 20 years ago during former Mayor Lionel Wilson's administration, local history files say. Efforts to make a major hotel and state-of-the-art convention center a reality was a front-burner agenda issue for the mayor and city council throughout the 1970s.

At the time of the ground breaking in September 1981, Mayor Wilson was hailed by Doug Salter, president of the development firm Grubb and Ellis, as "the greatest mayor on earth, for pulling this all together."

The 20-story, 500-room hotel, built by the ELS Design Group, was constructed at a cost of $88 million (including $6 million in city subsidies). The adjoining convention facility, including an 800-car garage and 60,000 square-foot exhibit space, cost an additional $41 million. Initially, the hotel was operated by the Hyatt Regency chain; it changed hands a few years later and became known as the Parc Oakland. It came under the management of the Marriott in 1995.

In order to prepare the site for construction, several structures, some dating from the late 1890s, were demolished, including the once popular Hale Brothers Department Store, perhaps still remembered by some longtime Oaklanders. The complex site took up the blocks of Broadway, between 10th and 11th streets, over to Clay Street. Washington Street, which had previously stretched all the way to the front steps of City Hall, became a dead-end at 10th Street.

The newly completed high-rise hotel made an immediate impression on the downtown skyline, most notably with its sharply angled frontage facing Broadway. It seemed to echo the similarly angled orientation of the Clorox headquarters building a few blocks north, which had been completed a few years earlier.

The convention center was dedicated to the late George P. Scotlan, an active African-American civic leader and native Oaklander (a graduate of McClymonds High School) long associated with Oakland recreation and programs for youth, and greatly admired by all who knew him. He died in 1982 at the age of 59.

In addition to OCVB's Destination Magazine, the bureau offers a Web site with visitor information (including lodging options), a calendar of events, convention and event planning, and links to area attractions and historic sites.

"Folks can find Web links to all the things Oakland has to offer," Belliveau said. The Web site is www.oaklandcvb.com, and the main number is (510) 839-9000. The new office address is 463 11th Street.

Learn more about the accomplishments of George Scotlan, Lionel Wilson and other leaders on the upcoming "New Era New Politics" walking tour, sponsored by the Oakland Tours Program, in honor of Black History Month.

The free 90-minute tour will be offered on Tuesday, February 3, starting 10:00 a.m. in front of the African American Museum and Library (659 14th Street) and on Saturday, February 21. To make a reservation, call the Oakland Tours Program hotline, (510) 238-3234.

The Oakland Tribune: Cityside
Leanne McLaughlin, Managing Editor
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(510) 208-6477 Fax##
lmclaughlin@angnewspapers.com Email

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