Spencer Roach, a member of the Florida House of Representatives, tweeted this morning that he and fellow legislators have had meetings about repealing the 1967 Reedy Creek Improvement Act, which created a special district around Walt Disney World.
Roach tweeted that yesterday was the second meeting discussing a repeal and, “If Disney wants to embrace woke ideology, it seems fitting that they should be regulated by Orange County,” referencing Disney’s condemnation of the “Don’t Say Gay” bill.
The 1967 act allowed Disney to create the Reedy Creek Improvement District, the self-described purpose being “to support and administer certain aspects of the economic development and tourism within District boundaries.” The creation of the district means Walt Disney World and other landowners pay for local essential services like water, electricity, fire protection, and emergency medical services instead of taxpayers.
Florida Governor Ron DeSantis has been criticizing Disney’s stance against the now passed bill, most recently saying, “They do not run this state. They do not control this state,” after Disney stated their hope of repealing the bill.
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This will serve Disney right. Let them get a taste of their own medicine. They love government and woke politicians so much, submit to more government regulation.
“Walt Disney World and other landowners pay for local essential services like water, electricity, fire protection, and emergency medical services instead of taxpayers.”
Repealing this literally benefits Disney by putting the burden on the taxpayer instead of Disney paying for all of it. This is all performative, and the only people the GOP will be hurting is the taxpayer, as usual.
It means Disney would be paying for these services. NOT the taxpayer. Read before commenting
The gov does not give a crap about the tax payers only thing he cares about is his own bid for president. We need him out
“Cancel culture is bad except when we do it”
I’m not sure if they are serious or are just saying it to be so.
He is very serious does not care about the tax payers
Repealing the Reedy Creek Improvement District act seems extreme to me.
Disney over stepped it’s bounds commenting on purely political issues not related to the operation of it’s business. Grossly over stepped it’s bounds.
But for over 55 years the RCID has allowed Disney to build a world class destination resort that has greatly benefited the state of Florida. It would be a shame to change that relationship with Disney.
That being said, Disney need to focus on it’s business and stay out of state politics where it doesn’t directly impact it’s businesses.
I think Disney probably believes it will negatively impact their business, making it harder to hire creative talent and rescuing attendace by turning off the 60% of the public who aren’t anti LGBT.
This will clearly cause an uprising against the governor.
To be continued…
For all those DeSantis haters, please note this is NOT his doing but the Florida House of Representatives, in which they are looking to introduce legislation which will need to be signed or veto’d by the governor. Personally, I think this is a long shot but I get why they are doing it – Disney wants to play politics, so the State will play right along!
So the only one that has an opinion is the mm guy in the gov set
The moment this becomes a bill and gains some momentum in the legislature the Disney Board of Directors will fire Chapek and hand his head to DeSantis as a trophy.
Disney is held hostage to it’s real estate and capital investments, they’re going nowhere. That deal Walt negotiated with the state, yeah, it cannot be endangered by Chapek. Chapek, in trying to appease the Woke Crybabies in the the Twitterverse, is threatening harm to Disney shareholders. That makes Chapek and completely expendable “asset”. Disney needs to keep it’s corporate mouth shut on topics of this nature. No speech, no cash, no acknowledgement. As a Disney shareholder, *I* want Chapek’s head, rhetorically of course, on a platter delivered to DeSantis with assurances from the Board of Directors that Disney will keep it’s freaking mouth shut on political issues.
Why not write a letter about it to them about it.
Then maybe yoy can try and do something if it bothers you.
It’s not a bill anymore.
Disney could literally fund the campaigns of anyone who wants to run for office in FL. These radical congressmen better be careful who they wage war with.
No comment on how we got here or the Supreme Court ruling I’m about to mention, but if this passed it is clearly a violation of Disney’s 1st amendment free speech rights. They even tweeted it was a punishment for what Disney said.
Company’s are not a person they don’t get free speech rights
So, I assume people who are currently advocating for this repeal of Reedy Creek are ready and willing to start paying for its services with their taxes instead? Because that’s how you’d be “punishing” Disney – by paying for essential services offered within their district, like water and electricity, whether you use them or not.
Then we don’t go to Disney. Universal is looking better and better. I skipped Disney last year. I had the time of my life. They want to be woke? They want to nickle and dime their customers? Then we can skip
^^ That’s a complete misunderstanding of the relationship between Disney and Reedy Creek Improvement District. RCID is inherently “neutral”, in that it collects taxes from Disney, just like any other municipality, even though Disney is its only “resident” (Disney appoints residents each year to “live” in RCID and vote on Disney’s behalf). If Orange County annexes RCID, the taxes will instead go to Orange County, who will then staff RCID.
Taxpayers wouldn’t be footing the bill, and if anything, more money would flow from Disney to Orange County even after subtracting the cost of Orange County to provide those services such as fire, water, and law enforcement.
I believe you’re wrong in regards to county residents paying for these services. Disney currently earns tax revenue instead of the counties and state. That tax revenue would immediately go to the counties and that same tax revenue would pay for all the services Disney currently offers. Disney would be put in a world of hurt. No longer could they change their signs, build anything new without getting approval from Orange and Osceola county, paying all the permit fees, paying environmental impact fees, paying fees for nearly anything that all other businesses are forced to pay. Right now Disney makes all the rules. That would change and would force Disney to play by the rules of a slow moving county government. If they want to play politics, force them to play by the same rules that all other private businesses are forced to abide by in Florida.
great comment
Why not write a letter about it to them about it.
In 1967 Disney took a chance building in a swamp and Florida gave them a break to assist them. Today there’s a number of theme parks in Florida that are not given that same special treatment as Disney. Time to treat all these businesses the same, regardless of their political leanings.
It baffles me that you people still think that human rights is a political issue. It’s disgusting. Disney absolutely SHOULD speak out against an abusive, oppressive, prejudiced, backward-thinking law that directly hurts people. None of you had a problem when the optics were that the company supported it, and you believe that they should present the governor with Chapek’s head (revolting linguistics, by the way) — how is this not being involved in politics? Any law that is designed to further marginalize, divide, and damage human beings for no other reason than some closed-minded, improperly raised, poorly adjusted people fear what’s different and can’t comprehend that they are not the gold standard by which all people should be defined should be protested, attacked, and torn down, and Disney is doing exactly the right thing.
Public school is just that. PUBLIC. That means people of all kinds will go there and have their children go there. It is not the government’s right to determine that the acknowledgment of some people is not appropriate or “offensive”. Children learn about heterosexuality and civil rights when they are in kindergarten. They can learn about the existence of other people as well. If a parent is so screwed up they can’t stand the idea of their child knowing about the actual world and the real people who exist within it, they should take their child out of school and put them in a private school or homeschool them. They’ll just be producing another bane on society, but at least the decent people who understand not everyone is the same and you don’t get to deny human rights will know their children are living and learning in today rather than the darkness of the past.
The biggest crime is that politicians have convinced you that human rights are a political issue. Disney employs humans, their business relies on humans, and Disney is protecting those humans from harm. To dismiss that as woke politics is playing into the hand of politicians who would rather us fight about identity politics than hold them accountable for anything that matters.
Chapek blew it. If he had really read the Parental Rights bill, he would have stayed neutral and avoided all this trouble.
On Friday, December 10, 2021, we went to WDW Hollywood Studios. On our way to WDW transportation around 11-2, we stopped to get pressed coins for my grandson. I got change for a $20 from Celebrity 5 & 10 and crossed the street to go to Mickeys of Hollywood. When I approached the sidewalk, I tripped hitting my head and fracturing my right elbow bone. When workers were starting to surround me, one of the workers tripped on the same part of the sidewalk. I don’t know if tripping is because of how the corner is painted or higher than normal sidewalk corners. When Reedy Creek EMS got there, they seemed on edge because of other accidents at the park. I have requested a copy of the Incident report by mail and email. Email response: “Your registration for reedycreek.org has been rejected. The login information you provided either was not verifiable or did not conform to the requirements of the site. Please try again. If you have any questions use the contact form on our website to contact us. Thank you.” Phone call: I left a message and no one called me back. Maybe it is better to have WDW handle the Reedy Creek EMS.