Sadaf Knight, CEO, Florida Policy Institute 

Sadaf Knight serves as chief executive officer of Florida Policy Institute (FPI), leading the organization’s efforts to achieve broadly shared prosperity for all Floridians. She has more than 15 years of experience in public policy research, advocacy, and nonprofit management. Her areas of expertise include revenue, economic development and community development policy. 

Prior to joining FPI in 2018, she was vice president of policy and research at Carolina Small Business Development Fund (CSBDF), a community development financial institution based in Raleigh, North Carolina. 

Knight also served as a policy analyst and community leadership fellow at MassBudget, focusing on economic development and revenue policy, and as a program manager at New York Jobs with Justice (now called Align NY), where she led advocacy efforts around economic development reform. 

Sadaf holds certificates in nonprofit management and community development finance. She received a Bachelor of Science in conservation and resource studies from the University of California, Berkeley and a Master of Urban Planning from Columbia University. 

Amy Mercado, Orange County Property Appraiser 

Amy Mercado was elected as Orange County Property Appraiser in November 2020. The Orange County Property Appraiser is an elected constitutional officer. 

In 2016, Mercado was elected as a State Representative for Florida House District 48 and was subsequently re-elected in 2018, serving on committees such as the important Ways & Means Committee.

She also served as the director of operations for a national commodity board, where she was responsible for managing a multimillion-dollar budget, reputation and crisis management, organizational leadership, vendor procurement, compliance and human resources.

Amy earned her Executive MBA from the Jack Welch Management Institute at Strayer University and a bachelor’s degree in Business Administration with a concentration in Management from American Intercontinental University.

Amy is of Puerto Rican descent and was born and raised in the Bronx, New York. She has called Orange County home since 1996.

Jason Garcia, Investigative Reporter, Newsletter Author and Podcaster

Jason Garcia is one of Florida’s leading investigative journalists and the publisher of "Seeking Rents" an independent newsletter and podcast about state politics that is followed closely by elected officials, government officials, journalists and activists from Miami to Tallahassee. 

Garcia’s reporting explores the ways in which big businesses and other special interests are influencing public policy in the nation’s third-largest state.  

“Rent-seeking" is a term in economics that describes when a corporation uses its political influence to turn tax laws and public policy in its favor.

He previously worked for the Orlando Sentinel, where he wrote an award-winning series on corporate-tax avoidance and led a yearlong investigation into a “ghost candidate” election scandal that exposed the roles of consultants for Florida Power & Light, Florida Crystals and Mosaic in political schemes around the state. 

Prior to that, he was an associate editor for Florida Trend, covering state politics and business for the business-news publication.

Garcia is originally from Guelph, Ontario. He graduated with a bachelor’s degree in journalism from the University of Maryland, College Park.

Steve Mort, host of “Talking Central Florida”

Journalist Steve Mort has been based in Orlando for about 20 years. He’s the host of the podcast Talking Central Florida from the News Collaborative of Central Florida. The show airs Wednesdays at 6:30 p.m. on Central Florida Public Media and is also available on major podcast platforms and YouTube.

In 2019, he joined WUCF, Central Florida’s PBS station, as executive producer of “NewsNight.” He began hosting the show in 2020 and continued until its cancellation last year.

Steve has traveled nationally and internationally on assignment as a videographer and producer for outlets including the “PBS NewsHour,” and spent two years away from Central Florida reporting for Rocky Mountain PBS in Denver.

Before moving to Orlando in 2005, Steve covered Washington and the United Nations for a variety of international news outlets.

He began his career in the United Kingdom, where he worked as a radio journalist for the BBC, ITN and other broadcasters.