Editor's note (December 2, 2011 @ 10:30 a.m. CT): Here at Midwest Meetings, we don't necessarily  feel we should need to defend the conference costs incurred by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac during the recent Mortgage Bankers Association's annual meeting in Chicago. After all, the costs breakdown in the Federal Housing Finance Agency's response appears to contain justifiable line items. It looks pretty self-explanatory to us.

But alas, there's the rub: it makes sense to those who know what they're looking at.

Lawmakers, mainstream media, and the general public, on the other hand, don't have that meetings industry "insider" perspective. And $640,000 does sound like an awfully big number if one doesn't understand how to put it into perspective. So how do we, as an industry, get the message across?

Scroll down for updates as Midwest Meetings continues to gain commentary and insight regarding the latest black eye to the meetings industry from the mainstream media.

Original post: December 1, 2011 @ 9:30 a.m. CT

Here we go again: another "lavish" conference, another "junket," another "boondoggle." Right? That's what some voices of public perception are trying to tell us... even though a federal regulatory agency has already "defended the spending as a whole."

So what is it this time? On the heels of public incomprehension surrounding justifiable conference costs in relation to the supposedly nefarious Muffingate "scandal," here's the scoop on Fox News:

"Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac Spend More Than $640G on Conference"

Here at Midwest Meetings, we imagine there are others within the meetings industry already doing the same eye-roll we did when we saw the headlines. Needless to say, mainstream media reporting on the matter leaves a few - shall we say - unanswered questions to the imagination.

In a nut shell, according to Fox News, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac sent 100 employees to a recent Chicago mortgage-industry conference this fall, and Rep. Randy Neugebauer (R., Texas) challenged what he viewed as "lavish" costs. In response, Edward DeMarco, acting director of the Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA), provided a breakdown of the conference costs to Rep. Neugebauer in a November 23 letter. In the letter, the agency reportedly defended most of the conference costs, while acknowledging that sponsorships and dinner events could be curbed with "more detailed direction regarding such expenditures in the future," according to Fox News.

As reported in the article, "The spending included nearly $342,000 for travel, food, hotel and meeting-room space and $74,000 on four invitation-only dinners for mortgage-lending companies that do business with Fannie and Freddie. The companies spent about $140,000 to sponsor the conference and about $68,000 for registration fees, the regulator said."

Do those numbers represent legitimate spending? Well, the FHFA gave Fannie and Freddie a pretty solid nod, but based on reports, readers aren't really provided enough information to answer that question for themselves, now, are they? A variety of essential factors are missing from the costs overview contained in mainstream accounts so far. Not the least of which: how many days were these 100 attendees at this conference? What was the hotel room rate? How much were the plane tickets to get employees to and from Chicago? What did that $140,000 in sponsorship costs entail? How, exactly, was that $640,000 spent, anyway? You know... items the mainstream media tends to overlook when attacking conference costs.

More importantly, from the meetings industry perspective, why weren't these companies prepared to defend these conference costs to begin with? Why did it take a regulatory agency to produce these figures? In the midst of public scrutiny over Fannie Mae's recent request for another $7.8 billion federal bailout, not to mention lingering "AIG Effect" flashbacks in relation to corporate travel, why weren't these companies ready and waiting with the conference cost breakdowns, just in case they were questioned?

Better yet: what can we, as an industry, do to counteract the negative connotations that seem to automatically drive mainstream media and the public at large to cry wolf and jump to immediate, critical conclusions about wasteful spending and careless oversight every time a meeting or conference is mentioned in a headline?

(On that note, meetings industry guru Corbin Ball, CMP, CSP shared a few thoughts about advocating the industry during the Wisconsin Fall Tourism Conference earlier this month.)

In this case, Midwest Meetings is working to gather more information from the involved parties to help us fill in the blanks, and we'll be updating this post as we learn more.

In the meantime... what do you think?

Update: December 1, 2011 @ 11:55 a.m. CT

Here it is... Midwest Meetings has obtained the November 23, 2011 response from Edward DeMarco of the Federal Housing Finance Agency to Rep. Randy Neugebauer of the Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations, provided by Rep. Neugebauer's office. This response breaks down the costs of the conference and, we think, speaks for itself.

Update: December 1, 2011 @ 12:55 p.m. CT

Douglas Duvall, senior director of public relations and corporate marketing, has provided an official statement from Freddie Mac in regard to the value of the Mortgage Bankers Association Annual Conference to the company's bottom line:

"By attending MBA’s national conference, we were able to meet with our lender customers in a cost efficient way. In just two days, we held approximately 200 meetings with the key people who originate and service our loans. Moreover, we project that by the end of 2011, we will have reduced our annual operating expenses by more than $150 million below 2009 levels."

Update: December 2, 2011 @8:55 a.m. CT

More from Fox News... Neil Cavuto and Fran Tarkenton distort Fannie/Freddie conference costs (and reality). When confronted about the fact that he was on board not so long ago, defending against President Obama's damaging comments toward the Las Vegas conventions market, Tarkenton deflects into total irrelevance: "The whole notion of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac is a disaster anyway." And that answers the discrepancy of waffling on the issue... how?

The Convention Industry Council's Gregg H. Talley, FASAE, CAE, chief strategy executive, weighs in on the issue of media misrepresentation: 

"I think one of the things we have all learned is to not overreact to these headlines. Like the famous $16 government-paid muffin fiasco-which-wasn’t, the devil is in the details of each and every case.

"Many organizations sell or participate in sponsorship programs at major industry events and host invitation-only dinners. It all depends on what were the objectives of the participation, were the costs appropriate, and were those objectives met? Without that information, it's easy to sound scandalized by just the headline, but the expenditures might have been perfectly legitimate.

"Our business can be complicated for people to understand without the context, background, and details. So part of our industry effort is about education: understanding of ROI/ROE and learning that it is an entire professional field with dedicated, credentialed professionals working to insure the best use of resources for the desired outcomes."

Midwest Meetings is awaiting responses to yesterday's requests for statements from a number of our industry associations and organizations in regard to this latest case of mainstream misrepresentation of justifiable conference costs. We'll continue to provide updates as we receive word. In the meantime, here are just a few of the highlights from the FHFA's response to Rep. Neugebuer's claims of "lavish" spending...

• Freddie Mac actually saved money on conference registration fees. According to the FHFA, "The MBA charges its members as much as $1,145 per registered attendee for on-site registration and $1,095 for pre-registration at the Annual convention." By registering its entire group early and at one time, Freddie Mac received a group discount on its early registration fees and paid $875 for most of its attendees.
  
• According to the FHFA, "Freddie Mac's 42 registrants were comprised of a cross-section of the company's senior leaders, subject matter experts, lender account representatives and conference support staff." In other words, many of the employees Freddie Mac sent to the conference were there to be a part of the conference, not just to attend the conference.
  
• Within three days, company officials held 200 meetings with their customers, industry leaders, and industry partners. In addition, "the aggregate amount of expenses incurred by Freddie Mac employees in Chicago for the MBA Annual Convention... includes the expenses for the 16 non-registered employees in Chicago conducting business with people who attended the conference." So Freddie Mac employees who work in Chicago also took advantage of the additional business opportunities represented by the conference, and their costs are being reported along with the costs of employees who traveled to Chicago to attend the conference.
  

Oh, and by the way... if Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac were wasting taxpayers' money on some lavish boondoggle, then what were members of Congress doing at the same conference?

"In recognition of the importance of this conference, Administration and Congressional leaders also attend and participate in it each year," the FHFA notes. "Officials attending and speaking at this year's conference included House Financial Services Chairman Spencer Bachus, HUD Secretary Shaun Donovan, and Ginnie Mae President Ted Tozer."