Cities Civil and Municipal July 2024 Public Sector

Orlando, Florida

July 29, 2024

Orlando, Florida

A Beacon of Innovation, Growth & Collaboration

Known as a tourist draw, this world-renowned city provides so much more for its lucky residents

Orlando, Florida is a city synonymous with world-class attractions and enchanting theme parks. Renowned for its vibrant tourism industry, the city offers residents a lifestyle second to none and city-led initiatives have led to a thriving ecosystem of economic development and impressive growth for this Florida gem.

Under the visionary leadership of Mayor Buddy Dyer who has been at the helm of the city’s growth and development for over two decades, private businesses, tourism organizations as well as business industry leaders have worked together to ensure that Orlando doesn’t just embrace growth but steers it in the right direction that benefit the community and the residents who call this great city home.

Buddy Dyer, Mayor

Unveiling Orlando’s Diverse Economic Tapestry

“We have the great benefit of having one of the most internationally known brands in Orlando. When people speak of Orlando, usually the next word is Disney, Universal, or SeaWorld,” Mayor Dyer highlights. However, the tourism economy extends far beyond its iconic theme parks.

“We were recently named the best sports destination in the country by Sports Business Journal. We just had the Olympic marathon trial here, and the same weekend we had the Pro Bowl, so we’re very used to hosting large sporting events which is another aspect of our tourism industry,” Mayor Dyer continues.

“Visit Orlando is very well funded, we generate about $350 million in tourist development tax that’s used to promote the tourism industry in South Florida, and obviously, all of the theme parks have pretty big budgets related to that as well.”

Mayor Dyer adds “We also highlight the arts here in our community, and have made substantial investments, not just into the performing arts center, but also in the Orlando Ballet, the Orlando Philharmonic, and then smaller arts-related programs as well. We believe that’s a big aspect of tourism too.”

He acknowledges the city’s uncanny ability to develop diverse industry clusters, each contributing to Orlando’s economic resilience and innovation prowess.

While the theme parks stand as titans in the global arena, other industry clusters underscore Orlando’s commitment to developing a dynamic economy.

“Certainly our theme park cluster would be the biggest and most important in the world, but we also have a modeling simulation and training cluster, a biomedical cluster, and an innovative technologies cluster at Creative Village, we have a lot of different industries and industry types, and they are large industries of the future,” Mayor Dyer outlines.

“We have a long history in the technology sector, going back to NASA, and Martin Marietta, which is now Lockheed Martin, in the defense industries.”

Mayor Dyer’s emphasis on industry collaboration highlights Orlando’s unique ‘secret sauce’; a culture of partnership that transcends boundaries between government, businesses, non-profit organizations, and education institutions. This collaborative ethos serves as a cornerstone for economic vitality and growth.

“The University of Central Florida (UCF), is known as the ‘partnership university,’ when we’re trying to attract whoever it may be, you’re going to end up being in the room with both the Orange County Mayor and the City of Orlando Mayor, as well as the leaders of Disney, Universal, and our local downtown businesses, all collectively singing from the same songbook.”

“I think that’s an important aspect of how we’ve been successful. Visit Orlando and the Orlando Economic Partnership work hand-in-hand and have developed our brand, which is ‘Orlando – Unbelievably Real,’ playing off the tourism and innovation sectors,” Mayer Dyer notes.

“We have the Minority or Women-owned Business Enterprise (MWBE) program which has both financial aspects as well as training and leadership aspects to it, and we have MWBE goals for all of our procurement. We have a blueprint for those three community venues that have specific large goals in terms of minority and women-owned business that we exceeded, so it’s always on our plate to do what we can to help those businesses.”

Nurturing Small Business Ecosystems

In the heart of Orlando’s economic landscape lies a vibrant ecosystem of small businesses, driving entrepreneurship and innovation. Mayor Dyer accentuates the city’s commitment to fostering a conducive environment for small enterprises to thrive.

“We have the National Entrepreneurs Center, which happens to be celebrating its 20th anniversary this year. They’re an umbrella organization that supports a lot of small entities that assist small businesses, such as Prospera and the Black Business Investment Fund (BBIF). We have a lot of incubators, including the UCF incubator system, and StarterStudio, and they support small businesses, and we have a set of programs associated with our Community Redevelopment Agency.”

The city has a unique approach to revitalizing commercial districts by leveraging traditional small-town programs and adapting them to urban settings, to develop the necessary frameworks for new businesses, job creation, and community cohesion. Mayor Dyer highlights that this concerted approach has been so successful that the MICHELIN Guide has now recognized 48 of Orlando’s local restaurants, even awarding seven MICHELIN Stars.

Infrastructure and Sustainable Development

As Orlando grapples with rapid population growth, Mayor Dyer sheds light on the city’s infrastructure priorities, particularly in transportation and sustainability. The expansion of the SunRail commuter rail system is a testament to Orlando’s proactive stance in addressing burgeoning transportation needs. Additionally, initiatives to enhance broadband access and create resiliency hubs demonstrate the city’s commitment to equitable development.

Mayor Dyer’s vision for Orlando also includes embracing environmental sustainability, ensuring that all city-constructed projects are built to the U.S. Green Building Council’s LEED Silver sustainability rating. The city’s ambitious goals of achieving 100% renewable energy by 2050, and fostering a culture of environmental stewardship through programs like Greenworks Orlando, exemplify its commitment to a greener future.

Cultivating Talent and Quality of Life

“Creating a place where people want to live and raise their family is the best thing that we can do in terms of creating a workforce, because if you have the place that people want to live, then they want to move here and stay here, and work here. Identifying the job skills that we need to train people for are important,” Mayor Dyer argues.

“We built, what we call, three community venues, the Kia Center, a reconstruction of Camping World Stadium, and the world-class Dr. Phillips Center for the Performing Arts, which is right across from my office. They’re just as important for economic development as they are for quality of life within our community,” he adds.

Mayor Dyer emphasizes the importance of creating a welcoming environment that attracts and retains top talent, and the role that education infrastructure plays in developing a workforce.

“The University of Central Florida is now, depending on the year, either the largest or second largest university in America, and then within a couple hour drive, you also have the University of South Florida and the University of Florida, so you have 500,000 students within a couple hour drive of downtown Orlando, and Valencia College is one of the largest systems that has tailored a lot of their programs towards the workforce and the needs of our community.”

“We have Electronic Arts’ East Coast headquarters here, and 15 years ago they came to me and said ‘We want to grow, but we don’t have enough skilled workers,’ so we partnered with the University of Central Florida and created the Florida Interactive Entertainment Academy, which is a graduate program for gamers and is now actually the best in the country. The University of Central Florida is very good about helping us identify and meet the needs of our workforce.”

Charting the Course for the Future

In Mayor Dyer’s words, Orlando is akin to a teenager, forever brimming with potential, and still establishing its identity.

“We want to be a ‘future-ready city,’ which has two meanings to it, one is that we embrace the technology that helps us to deliver services for our residents, businesses, and visitors, and secondly, we’re creating an ecosystem that allows businesses of the future to use evolving technology to thrive in our community.”

“We’ve coined that we’re ‘the metacenter of the metaverse,’ because all aspects of the metaverse are thriving here in Orlando, whether it’s artificial intelligence, virtual reality, gaming, or the Internet of Things, and the University of Central Florida and Valencia College have very important programs in Cybersecurity. A lot of that is synergistic between theme parks, which use all of that technology, the modeling, simulation, and training that we already have here, and now the gaming industry, which is growing here in Central Florida,” he concludes.

As the city charts its path forward, guided by principles of diversity, collaboration, and sustainability, it stands poised to emerge as a beacon of innovation and progress in the 21st century.