Disney, DeSantis Tourism Board Reach Settlement Over Special Governing District
“The agreement says development agreements and covenants approved by a Disney-friendly board shortly before a state takeover in February 2023 would be null and void. Disney also agreed to drop a lawsuit seeking public records and withdraw its requests.”
Disney and the Central Florida Tourism Oversight District settled a long tug-of-war over the special governing district that houses the theme park and resorts.
Florida established the Reedy Creek Improvement District in 1967. It basically gave Disney the ability to govern the district since it owned the majority of the land. Oh, wait. The company would have “significant influence” within the district. *wink wink*
The feud between Disney and Gov. Ron DeSantis started when the theme park giant disagreed with his Parental Rights in Education Act. DeSantis also opposed Disney’s woke agenda.
DeSantis and the legislature rescinded the deal, putting a tourism board in charge.
All of this spawned lawsuit after lawsuit.
From The Orlando Sentinel:
The agreement says development agreements and covenants approved by a Disney-friendly board shortly before a state takeover in February 2023 would be null and void. Disney also agreed to drop a lawsuit seeking public records and withdraw its requests.
A 2020 comprehensive plan will be in effect, and the district agreed to “consult with Disney” while reviewing and amending the plan.
Both sides struck a tone of reconciliation with the settlement agreement’s approval.
“With this settlement, which is complete and significant, we are eager to work with Disney,” said Charbel Barakat, vice chair of the Central Florida Tourism Oversight District’s Board of Supervisors.
Jeff Vahle, president of Walt Disney World Resort, said he was “pleased to put an end to all litigation pending in state court” between the DeSantis-backed board and Disney.
“This agreement opens a new chapter of constructive engagement with the new leadership of the district and serves the interests of all parties by enabling significant continued investment and the creation of thousands of direct and indirect jobs and economic opportunity in the state,” he said in a statement.
The DeSantis administration is “glad” Disney won’t go forward with the lawsuit, according to DeSantis spokesman Bryan Griffin.
“No corporation should be its own government,” added Griffin. “Moving forward, we stand ready to work with Disney and the District to help promote economic growth, family-friendly tourism, and accountable government in Central Florida.”
DONATE
Donations tax deductible
to the full extent allowed by law.
Comments
That’s a loss for Disney, no matter how you slice it.
Financial. According to YouTuber “Andrew Esquire” who runs The Legal Mindest, is a lawyer who specializes in Florida District law and has had dealing with Reedy Creek.
He says this could cost Disney up to $1 Trillion dollars over the next century
I hope it costs them dearly, Disney may be facing an extinction event 🙂
I hope the incremental financial burden causes Disney to go into severe austerity mode, including downsizing or selling off ESPN
>>He says this could cost Disney up to $1 Trillion dollars over the next century
Who woulda thunk it, if you’re required to abide by the law it can cost you a lot of money. Which is why Reedy Creek was created. So that Disney Inc. wouldn’t have to spend all that money.
And Disney only has itself to blame for this loss. All they had to do was not push fucking children and they would have been fine.
But no, Democrats simply cannot help themselves when they are around children!
For decades Disney wielded its US popularity and goodwill to get sweetheart deals from the govt, the “special district” was one aspect, its continual renewal, of copyright past all precedence another. Well, Go Woke Go Broke, they pushed that goodwill to the breaking point when they decided politics was the mission and not entertainment.
The Mickie Mouse bill, That should also be rolled back.
Disney cut its losses. It knew it was going to lose the Reedy Creek Bypass Maneuver case no matter how long it dragged on, and getting the public records would have involved thousands of billable hours more in lawyer fees with nothing to show for it. The only thing the case was doing is providing a fig leaf for their actions, and that leaf was wilting fast. So declare a ‘settlement’ instead of a loss and move on, which Florida had been very careful to leave as an option since letting your opponent keep their honor is an age-old way to encourage them to surrender instead of fighting to the death.
“Build your opponent a golden bridge to retreat across.”
― Sun Tzu
BHM- Billable Hours Matter
And crossing that bridge is a proposed 1400 unit multi family development on CFTOD property that happens to be going to Tallahassee for a comprehensive plan adoption. Shame to have had to have that turned down……
DeSantis defeats Disney in court. Again.
“The unAmerica, far-reaching agreements, that gave Disney dictatorial power over its previous self-governing fiefdom are declared “null and void.”
This ‘settlement’ is literally ‘Disney admits they won and walks away’.
Disney lost ‘biggly’. Their scheme to lock in near perpetual control at the last second is null and void. They dropped their suit and went home. Bob Iger got overextended virtue signalling with shareholder money and shareholders are tired of him pissing away money for woke/protest projects.
Yes, that’s what I said.
The ‘they’ was referring to Florida.
Florida won everything, literally the only thing Disney got was being able to spin their media lapdogs that this was a ‘settlement’.
Ok cool. I misconstrued you to ID the ”they’ in your post ‘Disney admits they (Florida) won and walks away’ as ‘Disney admits they (Disney) won and walks away’. My error.
Ah. I had to read that a second time. Your right in that Disney looked at the continuing damage to their brand and balance sheet then decided to throw in the towel.
It’s too much winning. We can’t take it any more!
Remember that guy? He looks a lot like Ron DeSantis nowadays.
After DeSantis revoked Disney’s privileges, Disney immediately tried to pull all kinds of tricks to protect that special status, including having the Reedy Creek Board pass a 30-year exemption for Disney from government oversight. DeSantis then appointed his people to the board and overturned that.
Then, the entitled groomers at Disney sued Florida in federal court, resulting in a DeSantis countersuit, and what happened next was glorious: Disney’s reputation fell into where it belongs — the toilet.
Disney’s movies began flopping at something close to a 100 percent rate, and now Disney CEO Bob Iger has a shareholder revolt on his hands specifically caused by Iger’s annihilation of the Disney brand with his leftist politics.
Disney is in more reputational trouble than at any time in its legendary history, so Iger probably figured it was time to fly the white flag of surrender so he can better concentrate on saving his job, and the value of his incentive and restricted stock options.
I have been anti Disney for 15 years, and skeptical for 10 years before that (BAD history of Pocahontas and butchering Hunchback into a semblance of a children’s story – FAIL – is what did it). I bought the classics for my family when the kids were little. Nothing made after Walt died. For years, I have been the odd one in my circle, the crazy anti-Disney lady. I am no longer alone, and it is glorious!
Pair this with the settlement two weeks ago over the so-called “Don’t say gay” law, which was likewise a complete victory for Florida, with the plaintiffs getting only what they could have had from the beginning, just for the asking.
The plaintiffs’ big “victory” in that settlement was that Florida agreed to print up a sheet explaining the law, and publish it to the school districts. It would have been happy to do that immediately, had anyone asked for it.
What happened to the satire video on internet created by former disney employee, called “Its A Woke World”?
Did disney manage to get it suppressed by google?
Nope. Still listed on YouTube
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jZChpvvLhmIShareholders demanding a return on their investment sucks. Woke doesn’t sell. The majority of Americans don’t answer surveys, don’t post online or talk to the press. They just quietly boycott that woke crap and move on with their lives
I’m old enough to have watched The Wonderful World of Disney on Sunday nights and the opening of Disney World on TV (whenever that was – it was a long time ago indeed). Perhaps the same kind of debauchery was going on then but I tend to doubt it.
Disney represents a certain pathology that has infected the American consciousness of late. All you need to do to observe it is to visit MCO on any given day to see adults suffering from Disney-induced arrested development. They’re childless, obese, slovenly, grotesque. They’re caricatures of functional human beings. As far as I am concerned, the demise of Disney cannot come soon enough.