Allegheny County ranks first in the state in terms of tourism spending, but the lack of a headquarters hotel hampers efforts to attract the largest of gatherings, including national political conventions, VisitPittsburgh officials said yesterday.

Joseph McGrath, VisitPittsburgh president and chief executive officer, said Pittsburgh automatically takes itself out of the running for hosting a Democratic or Republican national convention by not having a headquarters hotel with at least 1,000 rooms near the David L. Lawrence Convention Center.

While VisitPittsburgh routinely makes a pitch for the conventions, it's to no avail. To host a convention, both parties require a headquarters hotel with at least 1,000 rooms and 100 suites, Mr. McGrath said.

Denver and Minneapolis-St. Paul, sites of the Democratic and Republican conventions this year, are similar in size to Pittsburgh, but both have the advantage of having large numbers of hotel rooms attached to their convention halls, Mr. McGrath said.

He added Pittsburgh not only loses out on the political conventions but also has trouble competing with cities like Kansas City and Indianapolis for conventions because of the lack of a headquarters hotel. Indianapolis, he said, has seven hotels attached to its convention center by skywalks.

"The No. 1 reason we're not making the cut list, if you will, for conventions using the convention center or just picking Pittsburgh is the size of our headquarters hotel and the room block commitment in Downtown," he said.

"Some other things -- weather and things like that -- are beyond our control, but this is something we can absolutely change."

Although Cleveland developer Forest City Enterprises was selected in 2003 to build a 500-room hotel adjacent to the convention center, the project has been stymied for the last five years because of funding shortfalls.

The $104 million hotel would combine with the existing 625-room Westin Convention Center hotel to give local tourism officials a bank of 1,125 rooms attached to the convention center.

The state Legislature has authorized $34 million to supplement the $70 million Forest City has pledged for the project, but that still hasn't gotten the hotel off dead center.

Mr. McGrath said Forest City now wants to reduce the size of the hotel to the 300-room range because of the long delays and escalating construction costs. VisitPittsburgh officials believe they need at least 500 rooms.

Mary Conturo, executive director of the city-county Sports & Exhibition Authority, which has been negotiating with Forest City, said the hotel remains a priority.

While the lack of a headquarters hotel has been a drag on competition for the biggest business, it apparently hasn't affected overall tourism in Allegheny County. Mr. McGrath said the latest figures available from the state tourism office show that Allegheny County ranks first in the state for tourism, based on spending.

The figures show that 12.7 percent of all dollars spent in the state were spent in Allegheny County. Philadelphia ranked second at 11.8 percent, according to Mr. McGrath.

Michael Chapaloney, spokesman for the state tourism office, said the computation is based on hotel, food and transportation spending. He said the main reason Allegheny County eclipsed Philadelphia was that its transportation spending was higher, a factor he attributed to the larger mass transportation system available to tourists in Philadelphia.

VisitPittsburgh announced yesterday that the Mennonite Church USA national convention, with more than 9,000 people expected, will be held in Pittsburgh in July 2011.

It also said the Warrendale-based Association of Iron and Steel Technology, which will have its conference here this year, has signed on to hold a series of conventions in Pittsburgh starting in 2010. It is expected to bring more than 7,000 people to the city.

Overall, there are currently 80 bookings for the convention center between late 2007 and 2015, representing an estimated $271.5 million in direct spending and 305,300 attendees, according to VisitPittsburgh.