A Florida law set to go into effect this July will tighten an already broad exemption to exclude MMA promoter information from a public records requests.
The new law amends the Florida state public records exemption of 548.062 which indicates that all confidential business information required to be filed with the Florida State Boxing Commission after a match or obtained during an audit of the promoter’s books and records… and now expands the exemption to cover all confidential business information provided to the promoter to the Commission…
A portion of the law that will come into effect in July states:
“The disclosure of proprietary confidential business information could injure a promoter in the marketplace by giving the promoter’s competitors insights into the promoter’s financial status and business plan, thereby putting the promoter at a competitive disadvantage. The Legislature also finds that the harm to a promoter in disclosing proprietary confidential business information significantly outweighs any public benefit derived from the disclosure of such information.”
Within 72 hours after a match, the promoter must file a written report with the Commission. This report includes the number of tickets sold, the amount of gross receipts, and any other facts that the Commission requires.
As with the previous bill one could extrapolate the amount of complimentary tickets given out by a promoter for the event based on a state requirement that a promoter my give comps to “up to five percent of the seats in the house without including the tickets in the gross receipts without paying corresponding taxes on them.” The promoter may ask the Commission for authorization to issue tickets more than five percent in certain circumstances.
In addition, Florida’s UFC lobbyist Jeff Johnston has worked on the public records exemption which, according to this article, would close the loophole to disclose information prematurely. Mentioned in the article was the taping of TUF featuring the Blackzilians versus ATT in Florida. The new law would make sure that results would not be leaked early.
You may recall, that John Nash of Bloody Elbow was able to obtain a variety of documents from the state athletic commission which revealed how much it made on concessions, ticket revenue and rights fee. As the article points out, the Muhammad Ali Boxing Reform Act requires promoters to disclose to a state athletic commission the amount it is spending and receiving for an event. The law in Florida pertains to “pugilistic exhibitions” which includes boxing, kickboxing and MMA so the promoter’s disclosure is something to keep an eye on in the future.
Payout Perspective:
This bill amends the previous law which passed in 2014. The subtle expansion tightens up the law to ensure that all confidential business information provided by the promoter to the Commission is covered by the law to prevent it from falling through the cracks of being subject to disclosure. Essentially, the law ensures that all information a promoter provides to the Commission is confidential. Pure semantics but it likely gives the UFC enhanced security that no information falls into the public domain. With the UFC heading back to Florida in April, the law seems to be one of appeasement to entice the organization to keep coming back to the sunshine state.
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