Central Florida Tourism Oversight District appointed by Ron DeSantis formally declares Disney's agreements with Reedy Creek to be null and void

Apr 26, 2023 in "Reedy Creek Improvement District"

Posted: Wednesday April 26, 2023 10:30am ET by WDWMAGIC Staff

The Central Florida Tourism Oversight District Board of Supervisors met today and declared the February 8, 2023, Development Agreement and Declaration of Restrictive Covenants entered into by the Reedy Creek Improvement District and Walt Disney Parks and Resorts void and unenforceable.

The Ron DeSantis appointed board met today to nullify Disney and RCID's February 8 agreements

Earlier this week, the board released pages of legislative findings regarding the February 8 agreements that the Central Florida Tourism Oversight District say makes them null and void.

Signed into effect on February 8, just as the Florida House passed the legislation to take control of Reedy Creek Improvement District, the new Developer Agreement gave Disney significant control of the RCID land and prevented the new board from making any changes to the agreement.

Chair of the new Central Florida Tourism Oversight District board Ron Garcia said during the meeting, "Disney picked the fight with his board. We were not looking for a fight." He continued, "Factual and legally, what they created is an absolute legal mess, and it will not work."

Today's vote to approve the findings now directs the litigation counsel to have Disney's agreements with Reedy Creek declared void and unenforceable and stricken from the public records of Orange and Osceola Counties.

Disney has not yet publically commented on these recent developments, and it remains unclear if it will challenge today's decision.

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michmousefan11 days ago

cranbiz12 days ago

Not really a distortion of facts. Yes, RCID was a legally a separate entity from TWDC. In reality, it was controlled by WDW, which is why DeSantis had a hard on for getting revenge on TWDC for "don't say gay" and other woke policies by trying to revoke the district. He couldn't do that for many reasons so he got the law changed to appoint his own governing board. As we know, that really did fail miserably and there is now a board that is not antagonistic towards Disney. There is a charge for those benefits to the third party entities in some way, shape or form. WDW doesn't give anything away for free. RCID (and many third party operating participants) pay for those benefits (usually at a very reduced rate). So, in the case of RCID, Disney paid for those benefits through it's tax assessments because RCID has no income of it's own except for income received from it's taxpayers (of which TWDC is it's largest and majority taxpayer). So, what I said was true. WDW paid for the benefits granted by RCID to it's employees and RCID, by granting those benefits paid WDW back for them. This keeps everything legal. Yes, CFTOD wanted to stick it to Disney by refusing to pay WDW for those benefits, which in turn stuck it to the employees. RCID and CFTOD employees were never WDW Cast Members, they were employees of RCID or are/were employees of CFTOD.

LAKid5312 days ago

It takes little time to release a completed report. Unless that report didn't say exactly what you wanted it to say....

LAKid5312 days ago

Governor's office receives a FOIA (govt in the Sunshine) request... "What's sunshine?" 🙄

LAKid5312 days ago

🤫

LAKid5312 days ago

Florida statute says state records are open to the public. It doesn't say how quickly agencies have to provide the info. When I worked for various state agencies, we tried getting the requested info as quickly as possible. If it was a state legislator or governor's office, yesterday wasn't fast enough. 😉

LAKid5312 days ago

Bingo

Chi8412 days ago

So they had to ferret it out as opposed to the government releasing it to the news agencies. That’s understandable. Those requests can take a surprisingly long time to fulfill.

Stripes12 days ago

WKMG submitted a public records request. That request was just recently fulfilled and the document released. WKMG hasn’t said when they submitted the request.

Unbanshee12 days ago

Lol, you must be new here. The state doesn't like to "live in the sunshine" when it comes to matters that the esteemed governor finds personally difficult

Chi8412 days ago

The memo is dated June 21. Reporting on it the day after Christmas seems to be the definition of “old news.” Although it could be that Florida dragged its feet releasing it for some reason.

TiggerDad12 days ago

When you want to bury a story, you release it at Christmas when no one is paying attention to the news.

mikejs7812 days ago

That's a distortion of the facts. RCID was a separate entity that gave its employees similar benefits that other third party vendors within WDW gave, which included park tickets. Disney offered this same benefit to any company that operated within the district (e.g. Disney Springs tenants, etc.). Disney wasn't "paying itself" back. CFTOD wanted to "stick it to Disney" so they made an issue out of it.