TAMPA, Fla. — Visit Tampa Bay is the Ambassador Sponsor of the LGBTQ conference heading to Tampa this week.

The event kicked off Monday night with a meet-and-greet, and continues Tuesday and Wednesday with guest speakers, live performances and breakout work groups to discuss LGBTQ tourism across Florida.

The major topics to be discussed this week are challenges faced by recent travel advisories to Florida that were issued by groups like Equality Florida, the Human Rights Campaign and NAACP.

The groups say recent laws enacted by Gov. Ron DeSantis create a dangerous situation for the LGBTQ and black community traveling to Florida for vacation.

Leading the conference this week is Rachel Covello, owner and publisher of OutCoast.com.

Covello said the current travel advisories are a sensitive topic because of the support larger national organizations give to local groups.

“When they came out with the advisory, I think it was a shock to many of us, not just the tourism leaders but also LGBTQ community members themselves who live in a lot of these inclusive destinations,” said Covello.

This week’s conference will focus on ways inclusive tourist destinations like Tampa, Orlando, Miami and Fort Lauderdale can work around the advisories to maintain and grow LGBTQ tourism numbers.

“There are a lot of groups that are canceling, that are just not even looking at Florida right now,” Covello said. “So there absolutely could be groups that, and most likely are groups, that are not even entertaining Tampa or St. Pete because of the advisories. So we are all affected by this. All the tourism organizations around Florida are definitely affected by it.”

The conference will feature locally and nationally renowned guest speakers, live performances and breakout work group sessions.

Visit www.flocc.lgbt for more information on the conference.