It was during the closing ceremonies of the 1994 FIFA World Cup that the host committee's president first hoped Florida would one day host the World Cup again.
“I said, ‘Wow. This has been magical for our state,’” he recalled. “Let’s do it again!”
the committee president, who heads up the Miami host committee bidding for the 2026 FIFA World Cup, jokingly calls budgeting an unofficial competitive sport.
“Oh, I love the budget,” he said. “I love to just go tinker late at night.”
In 1994, organizers showed the world Florida could host the World Cup and turn a profit. This time, he said planners are much more confident in their budget ahead of the tournament.
“In 1994, we hadn’t done it before,” he recalled. “We were kind of guessing.”
Ahead of the 1994 World Cup, Florida taxpayers fronted $59 million for the construction of World Cup venues, which was paid back after the tournament produced a surplus of $163.4 million.
This time, despite a $2.83 billion operating budget, he said Florida taxpayers won’t have to shell out a dime for the 2026 FIFA World Cup.
“They’re going to make money on the tournament,” he said, of Florida taxpayers. “And here’s why: because the games are privately funded through ticketing, through the IOC, and through sponsors.”
Hosting again is not without risk. If Florida were to come out of the games in the red, Florida taxpayers would be on the hook, the bid's chief operating and financial officer told the Miami Herald.
But the Florida Committee for the tournament is confident in the working budget and has built in contingency funds to hopefully cover any surprises.
the committee president added, “What a great return on something. You don’t even have to invest it. Talk about ROI – return on investment – that’s a pretty good one.”
But don’t just take his word for it. The University of Florida’s Kem C. Gardner Policy Institute has studied and crunched the numbers, estimating a cumulative $6.6 billion in economic impact for Florida between now and the 2026 tournament.
The economic projections include almost $3.9 billion in state gross domestic product, more than 42,000 job-years of employment, and $2.5 billion in personal income.
“It is an economic win for the state and something that is pretty hard to replicate in any other way,” said Natalie Gochnour, director of the Kem C. Gardner Policy Institute.
Gochnour and the committee president say Florida is well situated to pull it off again, in part, because we don’t need to build any new venues. Money left over from the 1994 World Cup helped maintain Florida’s tournament facilities for years. When that ran out, the legislature stepped in, allocating close to $95 million in state funding so far to keep the venues in use.
The goal, this time around, is to leave behind a larger fund, “to make sure that going forward, no taxpayer money is required to keep the venues up to date operating and great for our communities and for our kids,” he said.
Hosting the tournament can also bring other economic wins. For example, ahead of the 1994 tournament, federal funds were fast tracked to Florida to expand the Metrorail system and complete several highway improvement projects.
“When you’re going to be host to the world, you get better in every way,” said Gochnour. “You know, our restaurants have to get better. Our hotels have to get better. Our population has to take care of the things that are important to us.”
Just as athletes train and prepare now, hopeful to one day compete on a world stage, Gochnour said Florida must put in the work between now and 2026 for a successful World Cup.
“We’ve delivered on that vision of becoming a water sports capital,” she said. “That’s our living legacy and that’s a plus to us going into 2026. We didn’t have that before 1994. It’s living today.”