Real estate mogul and arts patron Jorge Pérez slammed Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, calling the politician’s recent slashing of arts and culture grants from the state budget “a horrible message to send” to the people of Florida.
As the chairman and chief executive of the Related Group, Pérez has built a real estate empire in Miami and donated hundreds of millions to arts organizations in the city, including $80 million to a contemporary art museum that bears his name.
“A lot of the people who are coming from New York are involved in the arts, participate in the arts,” Pérez, who has appeared on ARTnews’s Top 200 Collectors list, said in an interview with Bloomberg about the budget cuts. “We want to be a serious city, and serious means that we have great education and we have great exposure to culture.”
Last summer, Miami Beach sold $97.6 million of municipal debt to help fund theaters, concert venues, and museums, in push to cleanse the city of it’s “Spring Break or Bust” reputation.
Earlier this month, DeSantis vetoed more than $32 million in arts and culture grants from the 2025 state budget, which led both politicians and supporters of the arts to warn that the move could disadvantage institutions across Florida state.
DeSantis later told the press that the reason for the budget cuts was his view that some programs weren’t appropriate for state funding. As an example, DeSantis pointed to the Orlando International Fringe Theater Festival, which he called overly “sexual.”
“When I see money being spent that way, I have to be the one to stand up for taxpayers and say, ‘You know what, that is an inappropriate use of taxpayer dollars,’” DeSantis said of the event.
Pérez compared Florida state’s budget for culture and the arts to New York’s, saying, “We want to be a serious city, and serious means that we have great education and we have great exposure to culture.” Earlier this year, New York Governor Kathy Hochul announced that the state would make $82 million available for arts and culture organizations.
Richard Milstein, board chair of Trust for Miami’s largest venue for theater and music, the Adrienne Arsht Performing Arts Center, voiced a similar sentiment, saying, “If we talk about New York, Chicago, or other major communities, they have this component built in to their lifestyle already. So the question is, ‘Is there that component within our lifestyle in Miami-Dade County or the rest of Florida?’”
While the Performing Arts Center was among the institutions that will feel the pinch come next year—it’s out $70,500 because of the DeSantis budget cuts—it is among the lucky ones, thanks to was Bloomberg described as a “a long list of deep-pocketed patrons.”
Not every institution is so lucky. The Orchestra Miami, which is run by founder Elaine Rinaldi, stages multiple free shows each year and has a robust music teaching program for public school children, lost a state grant worth $34,866. That was enough to fund the operation for two months. Rinaldi told Bloomberg that if she can’t make up the money with donations, she’ll have to cut her salary, let go of part-time staff, or cancel some of the orchestra’s free programing.