Julie Imanuel Brown was reappointed by Governor Ron DeSantis, on May 6, 2022, to serve as a Commissioner of the Florida Gaming Control Commission (FGCC). She previously served as the inaugural Chairman of the Florida Gaming Control Commission, initially appointed on December 21, 2021, until said reappointment. Brown brings substantial regulatory and legal experience from a number of significant roles in the public and private sectors.
Prior to her appointment, Brown was the Secretary of the Florida Department of Business and Professional Regulation where she led the state’s regulation of more than 1.4 million licenses across more than 30 fields of industry. Brown led the Department in securing unanimous approval from the Florida Legislature in getting the Department’s agency bill passed, which streamlined various licensing measures, and secured funding for the creation of a new licensing system. From 2011 to 2021, Brown served three terms as a Commissioner on the Florida Public Service Commission. Brown was elected as Commission Chair from 2016 to 2018, and led the Commission’s recommendations of electric utility storm-hardening actions following a period when Florida experienced major hurricane impacts for the first time in more than a decade, and she established initiatives to build and strengthen links between the Commission and its stakeholders with improvements in technology, communication, and quality of service. Before serving on the Commission, Brown was Associate Legal Counsel of First American Corporation where she handled a variety of regulatory compliance and legal issues in the Eastern, Midwest and Mid-Atlantic Regions. She also represented corporate clients with a specialized focus on matters involving mergers, acquisitions and securities, served as the Director of Franchise Sales and Development for Checkers Drive-In Restaurants, Inc., and was an Assistant City Attorney for the City of Tampa.
Brown has been involved with various professional and civic affiliations. She was appointed to serve as one of 11 Commissioners on the Florida Women’s Suffrage Centennial Commission, chaired the Florida Legislature’s 19-member Study Committee on Investor-Owned Water and Wastewater Utility Systems, was appointed to the Southern States Energy Board (SSEB) Blue Ribbon Task Force, and has served as a director on several utility boards, including the National Association of Regulatory Utility Commissioners, Gas Technology Institute’s Advisory Board and the Nuclear Waste Strategy Coalition.
Brown graduated magna cum laude with a Bachelor of Science from the University of Florida, where she was the recipient of the Outstanding Female Leader award, President of Florida Blue Key, inducted into the Hall of Fame, and received the Dean’s Cup for the College of Journalism and Communications. She earned a Juris Doctorate from the University of Florida, Levin College of Law, is a member of the Florida Bar, a Florida Real Estate Broker and a member of Leadership Florida, Class XXXIII. Brown and her husband have two children and live in Tampa, Florida.