DeSantis' Central Florida Tourism Oversight District to sue Disney in Florida state court

May 01, 2023 in "Reedy Creek Improvement District"

Posted: Monday May 1, 2023 9:44am ET by WDWMAGIC Staff

The Central Florida Tourism Oversight District held a special meeting this morning to discuss its response to the lawsuit filed by Disney against the individual members of the board last week.

The Central Florida Tourism Oversight District will meet just days after it moved to nullify Developer Agreements between Reedy Creek and Disney

The board unanimously passed a motion to sue the Walt Disney Company in a Florida state court. This is in contrast to Disney's lawsuit which was filed in a federal court.

In announcing the move, Central Florida Tourism Oversight District board chair Martin Garcia said, "Since Disney sued us, we have no choice now but to respond. This is why we called today's meeting to authorize legal action in response to Disney's federal lawsuit. This district will seek justice in state court here in Central Florida, where both it and Disney reside and do business. Yes, we'll seek justice in our own backyard."

Garcia says the state court lawsuit will seek to "uphold and enforce the board's April 26, 2023 legislative findings relating to the February 8, 2023 development agreement and declaration of restrictive covenants."

There was only one item on the agenda for today, "Board discussion and direction to litigation counsel and authorization to defend District officials sued in official capacities."

Board Chair Martin Garcia began the meeting by stating what the new board has achieved in its short time since overtaking Reedy Creek Improvement District. The achievements highlighted primarily related to hiring lawyers, consultants, and other advisors to fight Disney.

Garcia then suggested that the board's efforts are bringing the district into the 21st century, saying, "Disney sued this board to stop our efforts to improve the district and its operations. In essence, Disney is asking a federal court in Tallahassee to wrestle back the hands of time to 1967 while this board is instead charged legislatively to bring the district to the 21 century."

Board member Ron Peri in an address asked people to "pray for us." And went on to say that is surprising for him to be sued by Disney.

The Walt Disney Company filed a lawsuit in a Florida Federal Court last week, naming Florida Governor Ron Desantis and the entire Central Florida Tourism Oversight District board.

The board includes one of the authors of Florida's controversial Parental Bill of Rights law, Bridget Ziegler, Ron Peri, a former senior pastor of Evangel Baptist Church and now CEO of The Gathering, and lawyers Martin Garcia, Brian Aungst and Mike Sasso.

Disney claims in its lawsuit filed in a federal court last week that there has been "A targeted campaign of government retaliation-orchestrated at every step by Governor DeSantis as punishment for Disney's protected speech-now threatens Disney's business operations, jeopardizes its economic future in the region, and violates its constitutional rights."

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MR.Dis8 days ago

To give an example, I am retired from JP Morgan Chase, the provider of Disney Visa charge cards. I was eligible to purchase WDW and Disneyland tickets thru a portal for 20% off the rack rate. I do not know if that is still the case. While I was an annual pass holder purchasing thru DVC, I would purchase tickets for my kids when they visited WDW with their families. It was a significant savings.

flyakite8 days ago

Should anyone be interested and would like to attend:

michmousefan21 days ago

cranbiz22 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.

LAKid5322 days ago

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

LAKid5322 days ago

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

LAKid5322 days ago

🤫

LAKid5322 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. 😉

LAKid5322 days ago

Bingo

Chi8422 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.

Stripes22 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.

Unbanshee22 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

Chi8422 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.