Chris Cate: Welcome to the Fluent in Floridian podcast, featuring the Sunshine State’s brightest leaders talking about the issues most important to the people of Florida and its millions of weekly visitors. In this episode created by SalterMitchell PR, our executive producer, April Salter, the CEO of SalterMitchell PR, talks to Florida House executive director Diana Beckman.

April Salter: Well, Diana, thank you so much for joining us at Fluent in Floridian today. We’re really happy to have you as a guest.

Diana Beckmann: Thank you for having me, April. I’m thrilled to be here.

April Salter: So Diana, you have such an interesting history with Florida House. I know that you came to this job with a real passion for Florida House. Tell us a little bit about how you learned of Florida House, and kind of your background with us.

Diana Beckmann: Sure, absolutely. I grew up in Florida, native Floridian. My dad was a hospital administrator and my mom did not grow up in Florida. She really relished the opportunity to travel outside of Florida and liked to accompany my dad on his business trips. So he did a lot of work with the Florida Hospital Association up in Washington DC. So we would go up to Washington DC and my mom would always make sure we would go to Florida House. So I’ve been going there since I was a little girl. And after I graduated from Florida State, my roommate, Wendy and I, decided we were going to move out of Florida and have a grand adventure. And we decided to move to Washington DC instead of Atlanta because Washington DC was close enough that we could drive home in one day. But it was far enough away that our parents needed two, so we would always have a heads up as to when they were coming to visit us. Which my parents tried to surprise us, but called us the night before in North Carolina.

Diana Beckmann: So we had the chance to clean up our house. But we came to DC just wide-eyed and so excited. And as we were leaving, my mom was standing in the driveway waving to us, and the last thing she said was don’t forget to go to Florida House. And this was 1989, so it was pre-internet and my roommate Wendy and I were staying in a KOA campground 50 miles south of DC while we looked for a place to live and looked for jobs, and we got up to Florida House. And it was a place where we could make connections, we could send out resumes. My first resume had the Florida House address on it.

Diana Beckmann: Florida House provided a kind of a phone bank service for a lot of us who were just moving up to DC, and they would take messages for us. And so we would go back periodically to check and see if we had any messages or call in. But they, Florida House and the staff there, really helped me come to love Washington DC, and I felt like I had a home. There were people who understood the place that I grew up in. There were people who knew what a Publix was. It was just, it was my people. It was my people, and I fell in love with DC, and decided to stay there. Went to graduate school, and started working in fundraising and did that for many years without any connection back to Florida House. Got married, raised a family, and I was looking for a job and I saw a posting for the executive director of Florida House.

Diana Beckmann: And to me that’s it. That’s my next job. I am getting it no matter what. And I started… I just was very tenacious about getting this job. And I remember walking into Florida House for my first interview, and it felt like home. And I met the trustees that I was interviewing. And again, everything just felt right. And I’ve been thrilled to be able to be in this position and to take my love and passion that I have for my home state of Florida and be able to spread Florida sunshine all over our nation’s capital.

April Salter: Well, I know that I join the rest of the board of trustees in saying how fortunate we feel that you are representing Florida House and that you’re representing the state to the country because you bring a lot of passion to the job. So we thank you very much for that. And I know that you have been very busy since you took the job, now it’s been three years, two…

Diana Beckmann: Two and a half, almost two and a half years.

April Salter: About two and a half years. And you have had a busy time of it. I know we’ve had a lot of changes in our governance, and in the house itself we’re seeing a lot of improvements and much needed renovations. Tell us a little bit about that. First, tell us the location, for those of people who may not be familiar with it. Talk a little bit about that and then what’s been happening.

Diana Beckmann: Sure, sure. Well, Florida House on Capitol Hill is Florida’s state embassy in our nation’s capitol. We are the only state with an embassy. Other States have tried and everyone has failed and we are very proud of that and we always want to make sure people know that we are the only state embassy. We’re located just behind the Supreme Court. We have a gorgeous view of the capitol building and the Supreme Court. So being able to look at two out of the three branches of our national government puts us into a unique position. The house that we’re in was originally built by Edwin Manning in 1891. He was one of the architects for the library of Congress, and at that time the Supreme Court’s building wasn’t built. That wasn’t built until the 1930s. And it was a field that was being used as a construction site, and there were even cows in front of it.

Diana Beckmann: The house went through a number of iterations. It was a boarding house, everyone from interns to senators lived at one point in Florida House, but it had fallen into disrepair in the 1960s. But luckily for us, Governor Lawton Chiles who was in the state legislature at the time in the late 60s, and his wife, Rhea Chiles, and their four kids were visiting Washington DC. It was before he was elected to the national office. And like what happens to most of us in Washington DC when it’s your first time there, you get lost trying to drive around so the Chiles family was lost. And one of the children said, “Well, why don’t we go to our embassy? Because mom, you said embassies helped people. We need help. Let’s go to our embassy.” Mrs. Chiles had to explain, that’s not how embassies work, but the idea stayed with her. So after Lawton Chiles was elected to the US Senate in 1970, Mrs. Chiles was spending more time there and she found this dilapidated old house across the street from the Supreme Court.

Diana Beckmann: And the story goes that she stood on the grounds of the Supreme Court just looking at this house and she could visualize the Florida flag flying, and it being a home away from home for Floridians in our nation’s capital. So she raised $125,000. She bought the house in 1972, and we opened it in 1973. She made sure from day one that we were a nonpartisan, nonprofit organization. We take no money from the state of Florida. In fact, there’s a state statute that was created to talk about what Florida House is, and the third clause in it says that Florida House will never accept any money from the state of Florida. It also says in clause four that if the nonprofit running Florida House on Capitol Hill ever dissolves, the property reverts back to the state of Florida.

Diana Beckmann: So we work very hard every day with our trustees, and thank you for being part of our organization. We work very hard with our trustees and board of directors to make sure that we’re doing everything we can to keep Florida House open for all Floridians, and what we’re now calling Floridians at heart. Because once you’ve met somebody from Florida or once you’ve gone to Florida, there’s going to be something about us you love. So they have a home there.

April Salter: I love that. And so you’ve been busy, I know. Talk a little bit about the renovations that have occurred and I know that people who may have visited Florida House 10 years ago may be seeing a bit of a different Florida House now when they visit. Talk about that.

Diana Beckmann: Yeah, absolutely. We launched a new mission a year and a half ago, and our new mission is to connect, celebrate and champion Florida to the world. And those three words really drive everything that we do now. We’re working more with our congressional delegation up in Washington DC and with business and community leaders back in Florida to help make stronger connections between those two groups where we celebrate. One of the things that we love to be able to do is showcase the art and culture of Florida, so we’ve just started doing rotating exhibits at Florida House. Our first one featured Alan Maltz, a photographer from the keys with his gorgeous photography from all across the state. Our second exhibit, we worked with Florida Southern College and the Grove as part of Florida’s Natural to do the art of the citrus industry. And we had images of citrus crate labels that were a big thing from the late 1800s to the 1950s. And that’s how Florida citrus producers were able to differentiate our products from California, is through these colorful bright images on these crate labels.

Diana Beckmann: And we also are now doing the Florida cowboy art and culture and we’ve been working with a number of groups including the Florida Cattlemen’s Association. And we had Sean Sexton come in, he’s a cowboy poet. We’ve got a banner outside of Florida House that invites people to come in. And what’s been so surprising is that we’re getting people from other states who knock on the door and they say, we saw your banner and we don’t believe it. Florida doesn’t have cattle, and we have more heads of cattle, we’ve got more calves than Texas because you have a year round growing season. So it’s been a wonderful opportunity for us to be able to talk about some of our industries and the lesser known elements of Florida and to showcase this, and we’re having a lot of fun. We’re having a lot of fun with it. You know, we’ve been doing upgrades on the house.

Diana Beckmann: We’re open Monday through Friday, nine to five and we welcome people. You don’t need a reservation, you don’t even need to let us know you’re coming, just knock on the door, come on in. And we give tours. We welcome school groups to come in because we get a chance to talk with them and that’s where it gets to the champion part, is creating champions of our students, and our visitors who come here to be proud of our Florida culture and heritage. But also to find a place in Washington DC. We get, again, school groups who come in and there was one group from north Florida, just north of Tallahassee. And there’s one young woman who had never been out of Florida except over the border into Georgia. The first plane ride she said, “You know, the thing that makes me most nervous is I’m afraid someone’s going to yell at me in Washington DC, because everyone in Washington DC is mean.” And, Holy cow.

Diana Beckmann: No, no, no, we’re not. Washingtonians are, the people who are up here in Washington DC are good people. Come and be comfortable. I will tell you, you will get yelled at in Washington DC if you’re standing on the escalator on the left hand side, because everybody stands to the right and walks to the left. Because we’re in a hurry. We want to get off at the Metro. But to be able to turn around and create these champions for Florida and for our democracy. To be excited to be in Washington DC, that’s what we want and we want these students and visitors to take the message back, Washington DC can be a little scary, but we are excited that we went there. We’re glad we found a place and we want to come bring the message back home.

April Salter: Great. And you grew up in central Florida, born in Eustis, is that right?

Diana Beckmann: Yeah.

April Salter: Tell us a little bit about what that was like. What was it like growing up in central Florida?

Diana Beckmann: You know, it was really idyllic. I had a great childhood and we had a lot of fun being able to experience central Florida back before everything got so big. I was there when Disney opened its doors and I remember the e-tickets. But being able to grow up in central Florida was fantastic for me. Like I said, my dad moved down to Florida when he was in high school, down to the Fort Lauderdale area. It gave me a lot of opportunities. We were free range kids. We would have wars with oranges, and I was lucky because my dad working as a hospital administrator, he had a lot of opportunities through the American Hospital Association to go to different meetings, so we got to travel far and wide around the United States. But there was always something about coming across the border back into Florida with the welcome station with the orange juice. We knew we were home, and Florida’s always been home.

April Salter: Is there a special memory or something that you remember about growing up, a place that you liked to visit when you were a kid or that you liked to do? Were you a swimmer or a boating person? Fishing?

Diana Beckmann: Yeah. That’s a great question. I always liked it, I love water. Anything having to do with water, it was always something I really enjoyed. We grew up with a swimming pool, so we always had the opportunity to go there. I did spend time in, we lived for a little while in Fort Walton Beach on the panhandle and my mom is wonderful. She’s a wonderful woman, but she grew up in the Midwest and so moving to Florida was a bit of a culture shock for her. And I remember this one story, boy, she’s going to kill me for telling this, but it’s a funny story.

Diana Beckmann: We were living in Fort Walton beach and a fisherman had caught a small stingray. And we were down in Choctawhatchee Bay area just off the Gulf, and had left this thing right there on a fishing line. And we were there with another family and the two moms were walking on the beach and us four kids were all running ahead and we all said, Hey, let’s play a trick on our moms. So we picked up the string with the stingray on it and we started running down the beach. “Help, help, a sting ray is after us!”

Diana Beckmann: My mom went into panic mode and, “Keep running, keep running!” And she starts running to us to try to help save us. And she said later on, she said, “If I just would’ve stopped and thought stingrays don’t go on land, they’re not like alligators,” she said, “but all I could think of is my children are screaming help, and a creature is chasing them. I will help them.” And so we ended up, we stopped because we were laughing so hard and that’s when she realized that the stingray was dead.

April Salter: I think that’s something that people forget sometimes is that if you don’t live near the ocean, oftentimes you don’t get to experience truly the wild. You don’t see wild mammals in a lot of places. You know, people just don’t get to experience that. In Florida, we get to see all kinds of wildlife just as part of our regular lives, whether it’s fishing, or sting rays, or birds and so forth. So when you think about Florida House and the role that it can play. So for example, for the business community or for associations, what does Florida House have for them?

Diana Beckmann: That’s a great question. This is something that we are really proud of doing right now is we are expanding our corporate partner program. We get a lot of Florida based corporations and organizations that come up to Washington DC, or some of them even have representatives up in Washington DC, who are working to advance the interests of Florida. Our citizens and our companies and our organizations, with our Florida congressional delegation. We are, I think, the third largest delegation. So Florida has a lot of sway in Congress as a whole and we’re very influential on what happens on a national level as Floridians, and it’s a great opportunity for these organizations to have that opportunity to connect with members of our delegation.

April Salter: Well, people can have meetings there, they could do receptions. I think people don’t realize how they can utilize Florida House. It’s great for a young family, but it’s also good for the local chambers of commerce who want to come up to DC to talk to their representatives.

Diana Beckmann: Exactly. And that’s what we see a lot of. We work with a lot of chambers all across the state on their flying days and these are days where they get as many of their members as they can, come up to Washington DC and lobby and interact. And a lot of organizations use this as their lobby day headquarters because it’s a place where their members can come in, relax, grab a bite to eat, get out of the weather, whether it’s hot or cold or rainy, whatever it is. And they can all regroup together, share stories, what has happened, in a safe space. For some groups who don’t have that opportunity, they’re meeting in cafeterias on the Hill, the house or the Senate side, and they’re noisy and they’re uncomfortable. But here at Florida House it’s an opportunity for everyone to come together. And like you mentioned with the receptions, all of our delegation is very comfortable with Florida House.

Diana Beckmann: They enjoy coming to it. And what we find is that when we’ve got events, outside groups rent the house, our members of Congress are excited to come because they’re familiar with the space. We know them, and they’re comfortable.

April Salter: It’s a short walk for them. They can be right there.

Diana Beckmann: Exactly, and we even have a driveway. We have a private driveway, which in Washington DC is such a rarity, so members of Congress can go if they’ve got six events that night, it’s incredibly easy to be able to pull in, come in, talk to the people you need to, and then head on out your way.

April Salter: Right. As you think towards the future, where do you see Florida House going? Are there plans to… I know we updated the windows. I mean what are some of the other projects at the house?

Diana Beckmann: At the house? Well, we’re really excited because 2023 is our 50th anniversary, and we are really eyeing that for a great celebration. But before we get there, we really want to make sure that the House is truly the showpiece that we want it to be. We haven’t had a major renovation since 1982. We need to do that. So we are working with our trustees, and with our partners to look at what we can do and how we can create a more welcoming space. Since we haven’t had a renovation since 1982 we don’t have an elevator at Florida House, so it’s difficult for people with mobility challenges to be able to navigate through the house. We met with an architect who looked and heard what we wanted Florida House to be as trustees, and staff, and leaders, and partners, and showed us an incredible vision of how we could elevate our space. Make it more user friendly for our visitors, for our guests, for our renters, for our delegation, for our staff, and really turn it into much more of a show place to feature all of our work.

Diana Beckmann: Everything that we’re doing, from our education programs to our outreach, everything. So we’ve got our eye towards that to look at how can we really put the best face on Florida and on Florida House as we look towards the future.

April Salter: And already Florida House has a number of programs that recognize great Floridians. Can you talk about the artist program and some of those humanities type of issues?

Diana Beckmann: Sure. For many years we have done a Florida artist and author award where we have highlighted some of the best authors and artists from throughout the state. Guy Harvey has been a recipient in the past, so has Brad Meltzer. It’s an opportunity for us to, again, showcase some of the tremendous work that Floridians are doing in the arts and in the humanities, and to be able to get people excited about the, again, the great work that we’re all doing and we’re excited to get that going. It’s been on hiatus for a little bit, but we really, again, this goes back to being a champion of Florida, and we want to showcase all of the amazing, amazing Floridians and the amazing work coming out of Florida. And I’m excited to be able to get that going again and be honoring these amazing men and women.

April Salter: So a lot of our listeners are what we would call sort of key influencers. People who know their communities very well, who represent their communities in lots of different ways. And if they wanted to get involved in Florida House, how would they do that?

Diana Beckmann: We were very proud to be able to have nine chapters around the state of Florida who are our community leaders pulling together to help Florida House, not only to raise money but raise our visibility, help build these long lasting connections, and really take pride in our state embassy. And we’ve got chapters in Pensacola, Tallahassee, Jacksonville, Orlando, Lakeland, Tampa, Sarasota, Fort Lauderdale, Miami and also up in Washington, DC. And we’ve got a list of our trustees, who are members of the chapters, on our website at www.FloridaHouseDC.org, so FloridaHouseDC.org, to go out and be able to see who these leaders are. Or you just call Florida House and say, I love the idea of a state embassy. I’m so proud of what we do and how we are furthering the interest of Florida and our nation’s capitol. How do I get involved? And the staff, we are thrilled to be able to get you connected to the right people.

April Salter: Great. And I know that Florida House as part of its core mission is really outreach to young people through educational programs and hosting many folks. How many kids would you estimate come through Florida House each year?

Diana Beckmann: Oh, that’s a great question. We regularly get about 10,000 visitors a year and we’re expanding our work with schools and with student groups. Because what we provide is an opportunity for these students to come in, be connected with Florida, learn a little bit more about our nation’s capital. But we also like to throw in a civics lesson because that part of our mission is so incredibly important, is making sure that our students are learning civics in schools. But how does it actually apply to their lives or to the lives of others? And you can read about something, but unless you get into the practicality of it, it’s hard to wrap your arms around. So we spend time working with these students and challenging them when they come visit Florida House, and to be able to look a little bit more broadly.

Diana Beckmann: We’ve got one program that we do that talks about the power of the presidential pardon. And we start off by talking with students about whether or not the president should have that power. And then we give them an example of Dr. Samuel Mudd, who was part of the conspiracy to… well, he was convicted of being part of the conspiracy to kill Lincoln. But he was a physician in Maryland who took care of John Wilkes Booth’s broken leg after he killed president Lincoln. So Dr. Mudd was convicted of conspiracy and imprisoned at Fort Jefferson, which is now a national park just to the west of Key West. And there was a malaria outbreak when he was in prison there, and he was able to help stop it. So the warden actually wrote a letter to president Johnson and said, “Please pardon this man. He doesn’t deserve to be here.”

Diana Beckmann: So when we talk with the kids about that, we then say, should Dr. Mudd have been pardoned, and would you pardon him? But then, if you all don’t like this idea of the presidential pardon, what are the differences, how would you change it? What would you do? And it’s resulted in incredibly lively debates with these students, and they’ve come up with some amazing ideas of how to change this. They’ve also come up with ones that were maybe a little hard to implement, but they’re thinking. They’ve taken an abstract, a concept that they learned about… this is the presidential part and this is how it’s executed… but now they get the chance to live it and embrace it. And for us, that’s so critical, because we want the students to leave Washington DC thinking about how the government actually works beyond their textbook, and what are the things that they could do to influence it.

Diana Beckmann: I will tell you this one thing. We are working on an app that will help kind of bring that whole program to life, by looking at DC landmarks that have strong Florida connections. And we’re looking to make sure that the students understand a little bit better what exactly does it mean. And we take different civic concepts of American government, civics, history, education, and we put it into these different sites to connect these students. So we hope that they go back home A, with a great story, a fantastic experience, and they tell their friends, you’ve got to go to Washington DC, it’s a great place and we have an embassy that’s just for us.

April Salter: And just like your mom said, make sure you stop at the Florida House.

Diana Beckmann: Exactly.

April Salter: We love that. And thank you so much for your leadership of Florida House. It’s such an important place for our state and you have a very important job to do. So thank you for that. And we always wrap up our podcast with a couple of questions. So the first one, what’s your favorite place to visit in Florida?

Diana Beckmann: That’s a really good question. Like I said, I love water and so for me, any place that’s got water is a place I love. But since I’ve been in Washington DC for so many years, it’s coming back to my hometown. It’s coming back to Winter Park and being able to have the experiences continue to build on the experiences that I had growing up. It’s taking the Winter Park scenic boat tour, going and visiting the Alvin Palaszczuk museum in the Morse Gallery, walking along Park Avenue, going to the Winter Park Sidewalk Art Festival. It’s just, it’s home, and my parents bought a house on a lake, and so I grew up, again, surrounded by water. So it’s nice to be able to sit in the hammock on the dock and watch the sunset.

April Salter: We are blessed to have so much water around us. Diana, if you had to think about a Florida leader that you admire, who comes to mind for you? It could be someone now or from the past.

Diana Beckmann: Yeah, for me two people immediately come to mind. And the first person is Rhea Chiles. She was such a force of nature in so many ways. I never got the chance to meet her. But the stories that I’ve heard from her children, her grandchildren, friends and family, just create this picture of a strong Southern, gracious woman who had a vision, especially with Florida House. Florida went through some hard times in the 80s, and it was her strength and perseverance that kept it going. And it was her passion to keep it. And I think what would have happened if Florida House would’ve closed in the mid-80s before I got there… That would have changed my life, because I don’t know if I would’ve felt at home in Washington DC. And it’s thanks to her leadership and her work, and I see somebody that I admire, and we have a portrait of her. So every day when I come to work, she’s the first person that I see.

April Salter: And you said there was someone else you were thinking-

Diana Beckmann: Actually yeah, it’s another one of our trustees, Dr. Sarah McKay. And she’s down-

April Salter: She’s amazing.

Diana Beckmann: She’s amazing. She’s down in Lakeland, and again, force of nature. So incredibly smart and passionate about civics education and wanting again to make sure that Floridians are engaged in our civics process, in our legislative process, in any way, shape or form. And I love how she’s helped shape Lakeland. I love the work that she’s done in Florida Southern College and again, I’m truly grateful for everything that she’s done for Florida House, and I just enjoy talking to her. She’s in her nineties now, I believe, and I have to be on my toes.

Diana Beckmann: She’s amazing. I hope that when I’m in my nineties I am as sharp, and she dresses really well. I mean I find myself sitting up straighter when I go see Mrs. McKay.

April Salter: And how about, what’s an issue that you think deserves more attention in Florida?

Diana Beckmann: That’s a great question. For me, it goes back to civics education and making sure we’ve got an informed electorate who’s engaged in the democratic process. After I moved up to DC, my second job was working with a group called the Closeup Foundation, and it’s a nonprofit that brings high school students to Washington DC to learn about American government hands on and close up. And for me that was an opportunity to really look at the legislative process, look at everything that was going on in our federal government and how it relates back to the States. I grew up in a politically active family voting, you know, minute I turned 18 there was no question that I was registering to vote. And elections matter. They matter on the national level. They matter on the state level, they matter on the local level. And I would really love, I’m so grateful that Florida has re-embraced civics education, because I think that is so important.

Diana Beckmann: And I think that being able to give students a chance to come up to Tallahassee and to be a part of the process. If you can’t make it to Washington DC, go to Tallahassee. But making sure that students are, and everyone is involved. Even in local elections, local elections determine where your school districts are, they determine how your local taxes are going to be paid. And there are so many local issues that are important. And you know, I just, I really want to see a more educated and active electorate participating more in our democracy.

April Salter: And finally, who’s your favorite Florida sports team?

Diana Beckmann: There’s no question, it is Florida State University. I am a proud graduate of Florida State, and I come from a whole family of Gators. And for many years my dad went to the University of Florida, my sister did her graduate work at the University of Florida, cousins. The Florida/Florida State game was always a big deal, always on Thanksgiving. And matter of fact, my dad had his first heart attack two days after Florida State won their first national championship.

April Salter: I’m sure that is a good family story.

Diana Beckmann: Oh it is. It is. So, and my husband did go to the University of Florida, so I still cheer passionately for Florida State. My son is looking at colleges here in Florida. We will see where he goes and I will begrudgingly cheer for whatever school he goes to, or at least I won’t bash them. Because I’m very proud of all of our Florida schools but go Noles.

April Salter: Yes, absolutely. Well Diana, thank you so much for your time today. It’s great to hear about Florida House. I know we’ve got a lot of good things coming for us, and it’ll be fun to celebrate this big anniversary, so thank you so much.

Diana Beckmann: Well thank you April. Thank you for this opportunity to talk with people. And I’d like to just say that whenever any Floridians are up in Washington DC, please come visit us. We have a green awning and we are just behind the Supreme Court at the corner of East Capitol and Second Street Northeast. Please come and visit us. We will be happy to welcome you with warm hospitality and cold orange juice.

Chris Cate: Thanks for listening to the Fluent in Floridian podcast. This show is executive produced by April Salter with additional support provided by Heidi Otway and the team at Salter Mitchell PR. If you need help telling your Florida story, Salter Mitchell PR has you covered by offering issues, management, crisis communications, social media advocacy, and media relations assistance. You can learn more about Salter Mitchell PR at SalterMitchellPR.com. You can also learn more about the Fluent in Floridian podcast and listen to every episode of the show at FluentinFloridian.com or by searching for the show using your favorite podcast app. Have a great day.