Orlando Mayor Wants Pulse Nightclub Turned Into Memorial

The Orlando nightclub where 49 people were massacred in the worst mass shooting in modern U.S. history should be a preserved as a place to honor their lives, the city's mayor says.
In a local radio interview that aired Wednesday, Mayor Buddy Dyer said the city should purchase the site, "then make some determination, with a lot of input, on what a permanent memorial might look like."
"I think we need to determine some period of time that we leave it exactly as is with some adequate fencing," Dyer told WMFE, "because there will be people that want to travel here to see it as it exists."

The fate of the club, which catered to the LGBT community, has been unclear since the June 12 shooting that also left 53 wounded.
A nonprofit that was set up by the club's owners to financially assist victims said Sunday that the venue would reopen as a memorial.
The OnePulse Foundation later clarified that while the club remains closed for business, the owners would like for a memorial to be created at the site. A foundation spokeswoman, however, didn't specify whether that means the entire property would be turned into a monument.
The club's owners did not immediately comment on the mayor's desire to buy the property.
Last month, after the club was released by investigators back to the owners, someone broke in and caused property damage, according to Orlando police.
Flowers, posters and crosses remain at the site as tributes to the victims. On Wednesday, Dyer visited the makeshift memorial with the prime minister of Luxembourg, Xavier Bettel.
A motive for why gunman Omar Mateen opened fire at the club remains unknown. He was killed during a standoff.