One of professional rodeo's biggest events is coming to Central Florida.
In a unanimous vote Monday night, the Osceola County Council signed and welcomed the Professional Rodeo Cowboy’s Association to Central Florida for the next 10 years.
The National Rodeo Finals will be held at the Silver Spurs Arena over a five-day period in the spring. The county will pay about $1 million to fund the event each year – an event that's expected to bring in about 30,000 visitors.
“There is no doubt that with our tourists from England, our Brazilian tourists, they are going to want to attend this," said Osceola County Chairman Fred Hawkins Jr. "They really like rodeos so this is an opportunity more for them to be here.”
The World Championships are held each year in Las Vegas – a bid the county failed to get earlier this year.
But organizers said it only makes sense to have the National Finals in such a tourism and livestock friendly area such as Central Florida.
Karl Stressman is with the Professional Rodeo Cowboy’s Association. “It started from that – just a conversation about the possibility of rodeo and a championship event here and look where we are about six months later," he said.
There will be cowboys and cowgirls from 12 regions competing in that national competition starting in March.