I went to the Orlando City Hall to witness the Orlando City Council Meeting which would fund the building of a Pulse memorial at the former site of the Pulse Nightclub at 1912 South Orange Avenue Orlando Florida. On June 12, 2016, a gunman entered the club and murdered 49 people and injured 58 others who were out for the night to celebrate and dance.
After the Pulse massacre, the club owner, Barbara Poma founded the onePulse Foundation with the intention of building a memorial and museum dedicated the memory of the 49 lives lost. According to tax filings, the onePulse Foundation raised more than $20 million during its operation, with over $11 million of that spent toward building a memorial and museum project. The international design competition resulted some incredible designs which would require sizable funding to make a reality.
The onePULSE Foundation dissolved in November 2023 after years of fundraising, stalled projects, and mounting challenges, according to its board of trustees. Reasons for the foundation dissolving included, The COVID‑19 pandemic, which severely limited fundraising and disrupted operations, Rising costs, as the original vision which included a museum, caused increasing financial demands. Reports cited leadership changes and resignations in the organization. Survivors and community members called for transparency and accountability, including third‑party audits, over how public and private funds were spent. I know that people who helped consult for the project were ridiculed for accepting a pay check for trying to make the memorial and museum a reality.
By the end of 2023, the foundation had zero assets and owed over $500,000 in liabilities, including a mortgage and unpaid bills. The City of Orlando has since taken over memorial planning. Patty Sheehan at this City Council meeting implied that the dissolution of the OnePulse Foundation might not be a criminal act, but it should have been.
The City Council meeting to approve of the city budgeting $12.6 million dollars towards completing the Memorial was incredibly crowded. I have sketched a City Council meeting in the past and they are not usually so crowded. I thought that there might be some push back from some members of the community on spending so much money on the memorial. Funding came from a combination of city budget allocations, state and county grants, and philanthropic contributions. The announcement that the funds were approved was very anti-climactic and the council quickly moved on to other business.
Construction on the Orlando Pulse Memorial is scheduled to begin on November 25, 2026. The project will be led by Winter Park’s Gomez Construction and Borrelli + Partners. Construction of the memorial should be complete by the end of 2027.
