I used to live in Overland Park, KS, and am well connected to the s-f community there.

Depending on your plans for the con, you might want to attend at least some of the events connected to the Campbell Conference, which is normally held in Lawrence, KS, in June or July, but occasionally is piggy-backed onto something else, such as World Con this year, or the Heinlein Centennial in 2007.

I really, really like the Campbell Conference. It's sort of literary. There's a juried Best Short Novel, the Campbell Award, and a juried Best Short Story, the Sturgeon Award. Usually the winners in each category show up.

Here's a link: http://www.sfcenter.ku.edu/campbell-conference.htm

I've promised to attend at least so long as Jim Gunn is still with us, and he's 93 now. But he doesn't look any older than he did when I took his short-story writing workshop nearly a quarter century ago.

I'm moderating a panel on a subject I know little about, but that's normal for cons. I'll have a couple of days for Googling.

I might be able to catch you at one of your panels. Otherwise, I expect we'll cross paths at some point.

This is a nifty feature used by MidAmeriCon.

https://sites.grenadine.co/sites/mac2/en/participants/2517/David+Dvorkin