ORLANDO, Fla. – The city of Orlando has launched a resolution to help promote LGBTQ+-owned businesses by creating a database for city leaders to utilize as a way for those businesses to grow through government work.
"When it comes to inclusion there is no 'us against them,'" Sabrina Kent with the National LGBT Chamber of Commerce said. "No more 'the pie isn't big enough' because we all know the pie is as big as we collectively want to make it."
With this adoption, Orlando will become the first city in Florida to create such a certification process.
"We've been working on this for more than a year," Mayor Buddy Dyer said.
Trina Gregory-Probst, co-owner of Se7en Bites, is one of the first business owners to sign up.
"This is a welcoming community altogether but now this just confirms it," she said. "You know we're visible. They see us. They recognize us, the work that we do and what we contribute to the city. That means everything."
Gregory-Probst has become an inspiration to other business owners. This massage therapist shifted her career five years into a thriving bakery, which was even featured on Food Network's "Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives." Along with her wife, the two opened a second restaurant, Sette, in the Lake Ivanhoe Village less than two weeks ago.
City leaders say they expect to see more than 150 business owners throughout Orlando to join this new LGBTQ+ database network.