Democrats dazzle Denver with decked out Pepsi Center

The video screens and shooting stars brought gasps from 1,500 Colorado schoolchildren.

DENVER (AP) — Red stars shooting across soaring video screens will greet Democratic delegates next week in Denver, where the party’s national convention has turned a basketball and hockey arena into a sea of blue for the nomination of Barack Obama.

Democrats opened the doors to the Pepsi Center in downtown Denver on Friday to Colorado schoolchildren and party workers. Clutching digital cameras, thousands shuffled across the convention floor, checking out the three-level stage where a blue-lit podium will feature Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton and the party’s still-to-be-named vice presidential candidate.

Obama will accept the nomination at a bigger venue nearby, Invesco Field at Mile High, where some 75,000 will hear his speech at the home of the Denver Broncos. The modified Pepsi Center has room for between 15,000 and 20,000 people.

“This is so cool,” gaped 13-year-old Brittany Buettner, an eighth-grader from Highlands Ranch, who was among 1,500 schoolchildren given a tour Friday morning.

The children were led to folding chairs arranged on a blue-carpeted floor where the Denver Nuggets play basketball. They gasped when the video screens were switched on and shooting stars appeared to emerge from the main podium.

“I thought it was going to be just a boring old stage, but this is so much cooler,” Brittany said.

Workers were still stapling black covers onto chair rails Friday and hauling cases of Bud Light into private boxes overlooking the floor. After the public tour finished late afternoon, about a dozen live musicians tuned up on stage and newscasters practiced stand-up shots from their stadium boxes. Off the floor, workers installed a wine bar and draped tables in black for a makeshift lounge for delegates.

In a tunnel behind the delegate seating, a Xerox employee tinkered with six huge copiers and a chest-high stack of toner boxes and paper that will be used to distribute materials to some 4,400 delegates from Massachusetts to American Samoa.

Democrats boasted of having the largest high-definition screens available — 103 inches across — and the ability to connect with satellite gatherings of Democrats for nightly town-hall style conferences with convention speakers.

Democratic National Committee Secretary Alice Germond led students through a mock convention exercise, showing them how votes would be counted next week.

Before counting up votes for the favorite subjects in school — math was the surprise runaway winner — Germond told students that presidential conventions are still important even though the nominees are already known.

She called convention voting a “sacred responsibility” and a cornerstone of democracy. But it’s a good time, too, she said.

“Do you know how noisy this room will be on Monday night?” Germond asked, eliciting whoops from the kids.

Not everyone was impressed.

“It’s cool, it looks good and everything’s awesome,” mused Laura Londono, 13. “But it also would’ve been cool to use some of that money for environmental stuff or something.”