Health care trade show to stay in Chicago

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A health care trade show whose objections about McCormick Place’s high costs helped force changes in labor and other rules is returning to Chicago for its annual conferences in 2015 and 2019, the group announced Monday.

The Healthcare Information and Management Systems Society said it had received “positive feedback” from company representatives who have held exhibits at McCormick Place since initial reforms went into effect last year.

The HIMSS show attracts 30,000 attendees from around the world and expects to generate $33.6 million in spending during its convention.

The 2012 convention is taking place in Las Vegas.

With new labor rules and pricing plans in place, six other trade shows have recommitted to Chicago, and three new shows have signed on.

Yet a dispute still exists because the Chicago Regional Council of Carpenters has filed a federal lawsuit seeking to block rules passed by the General Assembly that expanded rights for exhibitors to do more of their own labor — putting up and taking down booths — as well as allowing reduced labor-crew sizes under new standardized rules of “straight”-time, overtime and double-time provisions, and new pricing plans for food and beverages, among other changes.