Today Florida Governor Ron DeSantis announced, beginning Monday, the state would move into a “full Phase One,” and short-term rentals can reopen if counties submit a plan for opening safely. DeSantis added, “If your plan says you’re going to accept guests from New York City, I’m probably not going to accept that.”
Throughout Florida’s shutdown, DeSantis has kept timeshares, resorts, hotels, motels, and inns open. He gave his reason for that today saying that he needed to have places to “put up” national guard if needed.
DeSantis’ message to counties: “For the vacation rentals, what we’re doing is telling counties, if you want short-term rentals—if you want them to be open—you submit your plan and you can show how they are going to be safe.”
Bars and movie theaters also remain closed, but like vacation rentals, amusement parks can submit plans to the state show they plan to reopen safely.
In addition, DeSantis further opened restaurants and retail, effective Monday to 50 percent.
Completely agree. Wow, way to kill the little guys who have this as their sole income or use the money to pay for their expenses the rest of the year. Should have been the other way around, keep the places with hundreds of people all in the same building shut down and those who have a singular vacation rental home stay open.
This is such BS! Saying he needs hotels open for National Guard or emergency workers?? There are NO, repeat NO, restrictions as to who can stay at hotels in Florida and they are full of people right now. There is no system refusing stays in hotels to anyone – they can be vacationers from New York, Texas, Louisiana – anywhere! Either DeSantis is lying about his reasoning or it’s complete incompetence. And, yes I agree short-term rental accommodations would be much safer if the only need was for housing emergency personnel. What a sham.