CONVENTION DAILY

Denver Operatives: Travis Dredd

by Brian Friel

Mon. Jul 28, 2008



Convention hall commander

Deputy CEO For Inside-The-Hall Operations

Dredd has been overseeing this summer's transformation of the Pepsi Center--home of basketball's Denver Nuggets and hockey's Colorado Avalanche--into a political convention hall. As deputy CEO for inside-the-hall operations, he received the keys to the Pepsi Center on July 7, giving him just seven weeks to tear out unneeded furniture and equipment, load in massive amounts of material, build the stage, and potentially reinforce the ceiling to support the heavy equipment that his crews are installing. His job also includes setting up the media workspace tents in the parking lot.

A Marine Corps sergeant in the 1990s, Dredd jokes that his staff worries that he will make them do push-ups if something goes wrong. He was deputy hall manager for the 2004 Boston convention, and his former boss advised him that preparing for the 2008 gathering would be much like a military operation.

"You're like the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff," Dredd said. "You've got to land on a beach, and you've got the Army, the Navy, the Marine Corps, and the Air Force landing at once, and you've got to coordinate them all at once. Otherwise, they'll kill each other."

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