LIVE from Minneapolis: Netroots Nation 2012 to be in Providence, Rhode Island

Sen­a­tor Shel­don White­house has just tak­en the stage here in Min­neapo­lis to announce that the next Net­roots Nation will be held in Prov­i­dence, Rhode Island, from June 7th to June 10th.

We had guessed that the con­ven­tion would be in Prov­i­dence, main­ly because we already knew that orga­niz­ers want­ed to bring NN to Prov­i­dence last year. They end­ed up not being able to due to a labor dis­pute at the West­in Prov­i­dence, one of only a cou­ple of union­ized hotels in the city.

Con­se­quent­ly, this year, the con­ven­tion went to Minneapolis.

But the dis­pute between the hotel work­ers and the man­age­ment has since been resolved suc­cess­ful­ly, so next year, Net­roots Nation will be in Providence.

To be more spe­cif­ic, it will be at the Rhode Island Con­ven­tion Cen­ter, which has a 100,000+ square foot exhib­it hall, 20,000+ ball­room, twen­ty-three meet­ing rooms, and is con­nect­ed to the Prov­i­dence West­in (the host hotel for 2012) via skybridge.

Net­roots Nation has nev­er been to New Eng­land or the Atlantic seaboard for that mat­ter — the far­thest east the con­ven­tion has gone was to Pitts­burgh in 2009. It’s excit­ing to see that the con­ven­tion will be some­where it has nev­er been before. Prov­i­dence is an inspired choice for this com­mu­ni­ty’s 2012 gathering.