NEWS: Here's What You May Have Missed From Florida's Orange County Task Force Meeting Today

Last week, we brought you updates from the Re-Open Florida Task Force, who met throughout the week to discuss the best guidelines for reopening the businesses of Florida, including the theme parks. Their findings will likely be a part of Florida Governor Ron DeSantis’ announcement in regards to reopening the state, which is expected later today.

Earlier this month, Orange County Mayor Jerry Demings announced that a similar task force would be formed for Orange County, which is one of two counties that make up where Disney World is located in Florida. The task force includes representatives from the Orlando theme parks, including Thomas Mazloum, senior vice president of Walt Disney World Resorts and Transportation Operations.

The Orange County Economic Recovery Task Force met again today (you can read our summary of yesterday’s meeting here) and one note made throughout was clear — the theme parks are being looked at as an essential part of bringing tourism back to Orlando upon reopening.

Guidelines for Reopening Working Group

As part of this morning’s meeting, the “Guidelines for Reopening Working Group” brought up the discussion from yesterday, which heavily involved around the theme parks. Specifically, it was emphasized that while yesterday there was a “working draft” of guidelines, they wanted to clarify that these are simply a “starting point” for potential recommendations and guidelines, and that nothing official has come out yet regarding guidelines to be implemented by the Orlando theme parks.

The meeting continued by pointing out that the Orlando theme parks, including Disney World, Universal Orlando, and SeaWorld, are the de-facto “experts” for their own industry. In reference to this, task force member Chuck Whiteall, president of Unicorp National Development, proposed the following to Mayor Jerry Demings, “Theme parks and other venues of that magnitude shall each develop their own specific and unique set of guidelines following CDC recommendations and using best practices that will protect the life, health, and safety of their employees and guests. They will be permitted to open at their own discretion with their internally determined level of safe capacities throughout the various spaces.”

While Mayor Demings did agree to some extent, he added that the members of the task force on the call should work on it to make sure there were not any “unintended consequences.” Thomas Mazloum, who is Disney’s Senior VP of Resort & Transportation Operations, was also on the call, and emphasized that everyone in the meeting had the same goal, which is, “the health and safety of our guests and for our employees.” He also brought up that, when reopening, they want guests to have confidence that the theme parks are a safe place to be.

Working Group for Bringing Back Tourism

Later in the day, another sub-committee met to discuss bringing back tourism to Orlando. One of the main members of the call was George Aguel, CEO and President of Visit Orlando.

Aguel spoke to recommendations being made for bringing tourism back to the area, with a heavy emphasis on what he referred to as the “drive market”, essentially meaning bringing people to the area by car versus airplane to begin with.

Phil Brown, CEO of Orlando Airport, agreed that the “drive market” is historically the first to come back after other instances of economic distress or natural disasters. However, he did emphasize that what he believes is really going to get people back to Orlando is the reopening of the theme parks, which he also mentioned as an important factor for the Orlando airports.

Dan Giordano, General Manager of Rosen Shingle Creek, shared similar sentiments, saying that, “When Disney World opens that brings tremendous confidence to the consumer.”

This situation is still ongoing, so stay tuned to AllEars as we continue to bring updates on further Orange County Economic Recovery Task Force meetings.