Host Committe meets fundraising goals

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It took a while, but they finally got their money:

After months of grueling work, the committee hosting the Democratic National Convention has raised the $40.6 million it promised it would — thanks, in some part at least, to the plan to have Barack Obama accept the nomination at Invesco Field at Mile High.

Denver Mayor John Hickenlooper, in a briefing to City Council members Tuesday, said moving the final night of the convention gave the host committee another selling point with potential donors: Luxury boxes.

Some of them will be doled out to big wigs for Obama's acceptance speech, which he is expected to deliver to a crowd of more than 75,000.

"By going to Invesco Field at Mile High, we doubled the number of boxes and that has helped dramatically, that and having the candidate have been a big difference," Hickenlooper said.

but...

The fund-raising continues — for both the campaign and the host committee, which have said for months that they need to raise closer to $55 million to cover all the costs associated with the convention.

"We've got still more work to do," Hickenlooper said. "There's always more work to do, but we are well past what our contract calls for. Once we got a candidate, the whole world changed."