What's Going On? I-Drive Chamber, Unions, Kelly Semrad All Call to Slow Down Giving Away TDT Money

The unusual allies expressed concerns ahead of a meeting today where the County Commission is set to consider Mayor Jerry Demings’ plan to give out nearly $1 billion

Oct. 19, 2026

By Beth Kassab

When the Chamber of Commerce that represents the largest tourism interests on International Drive aligns with both the local labor union and the county commissioner who was elected on a campaign of pushing back against tourism’s political power, it’s a rare day in Orange County.

Those unusual allies appear to have different motivations, but they’re calling for the same thing: They want Orange Mayor Jerry Demings to slow down his push to allocate nearly $1 billion in Tourist Development Tax revenue to 13 projects without subjecting each one to greater scrutiny or more fully assessing what local communities will need over the long term.

Today, those groups will be seeking answers to a number of questions when Demings and County Commissioners meet this afternoon for a special meeting at which Demings will seek approval of his recommendations for the 13 projects.

Among those questions, which center on a process that began in late July with the first meeting of Demings’ 34-member citizen task force to evaluate the projects, are:

• How and why was a proposal to spend $46 million on new soccer and track-and-field facilities at the University of Central Florida (UCF) added back to Demings’ list as his 13th recommendation after the citizen task force made only 12 recommendations and funding for UCF didn’t even garner enough support for a full vote?
• Will proponents of another expansion of the Orange County Convention Center succeed in getting that project added to the recommendation list in the final hours, even though the citizen task force also rejected it?
• Were all the projects evaluated using the same comparable metrics and standards agreed upon by the task force to justify the use of public dollars?
• If the County Commission funds all 13 projects at the recommended levels, will any additional hotel bed-tax revenue be available for transportation or other local needs if the state eventually allows the expanded uses of the tax revenue recommended by the citizen task force? Both candidates seeking to become Florida’s next governor have expressed support for expanding those uses.

“Government moves slow until you put a billion dollars on the table for the tourism industry then it moves at the speed of light,” said Commissioner Kelly Semrad, who represents Winter Park, describing the timeline, which began less than three months ago.

Today’s meeting could provide the last major opportunity for debate on Demings’ plan to spend more than $860 million, mostly over the next 10 years. Some of the financial obligations, however, would extend much longer. Debt service on a major expansion of the Dr. Phillips Center for the Performing Arts, for example, would cost about $32.8 million annually for as long as 30 years.

The meeting comes just two weeks before Election Day, when voters will select a new mayor and four commissioners, and about eight weeks before the winners are sworn into office.

John Stine, chairman of the International Drive Resort Area Chamber of Commerce, called the process “rushed and flawed” in a letter to the editor published in Sunday’s Orlando Sentinel.

“County commissioners have a responsibility to independently examine the recommendations before committing funds,” Stine wrote. “A task force recommendation should begin that scrutiny, not replace it. Unanswered questions require answers. Incomplete financial information requires further review.”

Similarly, the union representing food-service, housekeeping, and other workers at Walt Disney World and hotels near Universal Orlando and the Convention Center called for more time before the financial commitments are finalized.

Union leaders said Sunday in a news release that they would hold a news conference just before Demings’ meeting to urge the county to “take more time to evaluate the size and scope of the proposed commitments, provide greater transparency on the TDT financial picture, preserve flexibility for future transportation investments, and ensure tourism workers and the incoming County Commission have an opportunity to weigh in before long-term decisions are finalized.”

According to the county webpage dedicated to the citizen task force, today’s work session will be followed by a special Tourist Development Tax meeting on Nov. 6 and then a regular County Commission meeting on Dec. 1, just days before Demings is scheduled to leave office.

Linda Chapin, the former Orange County mayor who served as co-chair of the citizen task force, defended its process in an interview with the Voice on Sunday.

“We spent twice as much time on this task force as the last one did,” Chapin said. “We heard from three times as many applicants as the last one did, and we worked very hard to make sure this money benefited people across the community, so I will be very disappointed if they don’t move ahead.”

She said she was pleased that projects from Ocoee to Eatonville to more money to be handed out later to smaller arts organizations made it into the recommendations. She pointed to recent projects in Winter Park that received tourist development tax dollars such as the Rollins art museum and the Winter Park Playhouse as examples of how the tax is benefiting communities across the county rather than just in the central tourism areas.

Chapin did acknowledge, however, that she was “a little surprised” to see UCF’s project added to Demings’ recommendations after no one on the task force seconded a motion to include it among the projects the group endorsed.

She also said she was “very frustrated” that the task force was never given specifics about how much money it had to work with as it met in July and August.

A PowerPoint presentation provided to commissioners by county staff last week included a chart showing that the projected costs of the 13 projects would exceed revenues from 2028 through 2032 before the balance returned to positive territory in 2033. The tax’s unallocated cash reserves, or rainy-day fund, would dip below the comptroller’s recommended target of $300 million in 2031, 2032, and 2033, according to projections that assume 8% growth in TDT revenue in 2026 and 2% annual growth thereafter.

But Chapin dismissed the notion that funding the recommended projects would tie up all available funds for the next decade. She also said she was concerned about what might really be driving some calls to slow the process until a new County Commission takes office.

“I fear that for some of these people, not all, it’s a ploy to see if they can put it off until the next board so they can give money to the convention center,” Chapin said.

She plans to attend today’s work session and said, “if I need to issue a red flag about the convention center, I’ll stand up and do it.”

Semrad and others, including Winter Park Mayor Sheila DeCiccio, who advocate directing more of the tax revenue toward local needs such as transportation infrastructure, say the latest convention center expansion’s failure to win approval from the task force was a victory for the community. They view the convention center, which has already cost $2 billion, as primarily benefiting hotels and businesses along International Drive.

Mike Crabb, who was appointed by Gov. Ron DeSantis to represent District 2, which includes Apopka, and is now in a runoff on Nov. 3 against Kamia Brown, sent a memo to fellow commissioners last week urging them to add the convention center back to the list of projects slated for funding. Among other recommendations, he suggested allocating $523 million to the convention center while reducing the $400 million Demings recommended for the Dr. Phillips Center for the Performing Arts to $150 million.

Commissioner Mike Scott, who represents the International Drive area, along with Tangelo Park and Pine Hills, and is seeking reelection next month against Lawanna Gelzer, also pushed to reconsider the convention center at a recent commission meeting.

Roseann Harrington, Demings’ chief of staff, said in an email to Semrad that the mayor had the discretion to add UCF back to the list because “commissioners mentioned three times” when they accepted the task force’s recommendations in August that the action “did not limit them to only selecting among the 12 recommended by the TDT Task Force. Commissioners expressed interest in the Orange County Convention Center (OCCC) and UCF.”

When Semrad, a UCF professor who studies hospitality economics, asked for more detail about how the projects were evaluated for economic impact and why the county used a traditional economic analysis rather than what she considered more informative measures — such as jobs and wages, geographic reach, long-term operating costs, financial sustainability, and future TDT revenue generation — Harrington suggested that Semrad conduct her own analysis.

“After speaking with six of the seven BCC members on the type of fiscal analysis they would like conducted, the consensus was to do a traditional economic analysis consistent with the work done by GSU,” Harrington wrote. “With that said, since you have expertise in financial and community analysis, please feel free to do your own research and we will be glad to distribute to the BCC.”

Semrad argued that clearer guidelines were needed not only for the metrics but also for the process.

“My concern is that both the applicant pool and the scope of that analysis appear to have changed without further public Board discussion,” she wrote to Harrington.

WinterParkVoiceEditor@gmail.com