By MATT CHANDLER
Buffalo Law Journal

The Buffalo Niagara Convention Center will play host to the New York State Bar Examination being given July 28 and 29.

The testing, held in each of the four Appellate Divisions of the state, will bring more than 3,200 aspiring lawyers to the Queen City, and a financial windfall to downtown businesses.

Linda D'Agostino, sales director, said the Convention Center anticipates that roughly 2,000 of the participants will be visitors to the area, filling hotels, dining at restaurants and shopping over the three-day period.

"The figure we use to calculate economic impact of an event is $814 per person," D'Agostino said. "So the bar exams should generate over $2 million" for the business community.

She said that the New York State Board of Law Examiners, the governing body that administers the exams, will hire another 150 local residents to proctor the exams, as well as local security personnel for the duration of the event.

"The group itself is also paying for the Convention Center, so we are keeping all of the Convention Center folks working as well," she said.

While the bar exam is given annually in Buffalo, the difference this time is the volume of participants.

Diane Bosse, Board of Law Examiners chair, said last year the group tested 440 people in Buffalo, compared to the 3,232 it currently has registered for the July 28-29 exam. Bosse said the visitors to Buffalo will be coming from 70 different countries and 45 states.

"We found we were having a greater demand of people wanting to take the exam on their laptop, and we were finding difficulties in Albany getting locations where they could be wired," she said, explaining the increase in testing in Buffalo.

Bosse said 1,850 Buffalo registrants will be taking the exam on laptop computers.

Although there's been a large increase in Buffalo test-takers this year, the other three locations will still test thousands of applicants, she said.

"Because of space, we have limited the New York City testing to those applicants who either live or work in that division," she said, referring to the 1st Department. "And Albany still has over 2,000 people registered to test."

John McAlary, Board of Law Examiners executive director, said Buffalo accounts for about a quarter of test-takers.

"We have 12,875 people registered at the moment," he said. "However, some of them won't qualify, and others will drop out before the test, so we may lose 100 to 200 people from those numbers."

In addition to Buffalo and Albany, the exam will be given this year in New York City and Saratoga Springs.