Today marked the first call for the Governor’s Task Force to Re-Open Florida. A 10am call was held for a subcommittee that, among other things, was tasked with coming up with guidelines and a timeline to reopen Florida theme parks, including Disney and Universal.

On the call representing the theme park industry was John Sprouls, CEO Universal Orlando Resort, Executive Vice President Universal Parks & Resorts. This task force also includes Walt Disney World President Josh D’Amaro, but he didn’t speak on the 10am call. While the committee looks to create guidelines and best practices for reopening, here are some of the key takeaways that Universal is looking at, per Sprouls:

• Actions will be guided by Local Officials and Health Officers
• Theme parks are different than sports venues by their ability to social distance guests and pace their movement through the parks and resorts
• Screening of every Team Member (employee) daily
• Allowing or encouraging face coverings for guests
• Enhance their overnight cleaning and clean throughout the day
• Make cleaning visible to guests to help them feel safe
• Utilize technology such as mobile ordering for contactless transactions
• Expand Virtual Queues to more attractions
• Utilize more outdoor queues vs indoor queues
• Staggered seating for attractions and shows, perhaps only filling every other seat or row
• Putting limits on park attendance to encourage social distancing
• Reconfiguring queues to ensure social distancing in all directions

Even though these comments came from the Universal Orlando CEO, they were presented as possible best practices that the resort will look into implementing. It’s too soon to say if Disney will join Universal in taking these mitigation steps or not, but Governor Ron DeSantis is looking to have recommendations from the tourism industry by Friday.

As always, keep checking back with us here at BlogMickey.com for the latest Disney Parks news and photos. We’ll continue to bring you news and photos, where possible, through the Disney Parks closure due to Coronavirus (COVID-19) and will resume our normal coverage once the parks reopen to guests on July 11th!