News Reedy Creek Improvement District and the Central Florida Tourism Oversight District

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Isamar

Well-Known Member
Cliff said:
With Disney being the (vast) majority tax payer of the district. Yeah,...you are right, this put's the ethics of this in...I dunno,....an "odd" or "unusual" or "rare" circumstance??

In any other municipality, like,...I dunno....Anaheim, (or any other US city) this would be a massive "no no" and a clear conflict of interest. Could you imagine Anaheim giving their firefighters free annual passes to Disneyland? How about free hotel nights for their police to Disney's Grand Californian or Disneyland Hotel?

This might be a legitimate "rules for thee...but not for me" circumstance.

But,..the way this crazy district was setup in the late 60's....I guess it would be OK to look the other way on this one.

Let's just hope this is the ONLY conflict of interest that is ever discovered. (Florida's IG is digging now)

If this is the worst thing we have to worry about?.....than no big deal....carry on...as you were...
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I've done my ranting for today, so I'll just say that I heartily disagree with every single bit of this.
 
castlecake2.0

castlecake2.0

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
Cliff said:
With Disney being the (vast) majority tax payer of the district. Yeah,...you are right, this put's the ethics of this in...I dunno,....an "odd" or "unusual" or "rare" circumstance??

In any other municipality, like,...I dunno....Anaheim, (or any other US city) this would be a massive "no no" and a clear conflict of interest. Could you imagine Anaheim giving their firefighters free annual passes to Disneyland? How about free hotel nights for their police to Disney's Grand Californian or Disneyland Hotel?

This might be a legitimate "rules for thee...but not for me" circumstance.

But,..the way this crazy district was setup in the late 60's....I guess it would be OK to look the other way on this one.

Let's just hope this is the ONLY conflict of interest that is ever discovered. (Florida's IG is digging now)

If this is the worst thing we have to worry about?.....than no big deal....carry on...as you were...
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Anaheim is a publicly elected municipality, not a special taxing district
 
GCTales

GCTales

Well-Known Member
Cliff said:
My complaint is this: I live in the Miami area. I would NOT want to see the city of Miami spending millions and millions of dollars by giving government employees Miami Dolphins season tickets and event Hard Rock stadium game/concert tickets as "perks". The Hard Rock Stadium is a large business that should not be "favored" by it's local government with a constant flow of millions in automatic ticket sales....purchased by the city. It's just bad optics

Yes,...I feel for the firefighters. I know it's nice to have their local government buying millions of dollars worth of tickets for them. I get it. I wish my employer would pay for my annual pass!! I think private companies can do this....OK...but NOT public governments. Would it be OK for the Orange County property tax appraisers to receive free gifts/perks from the very properties/companies that he manages property tax on? If he were given a week of free hotel rooms on the property that is being tax assessed? See?

But let's face it,....if any other city or county government in the US were spending millions of dollars on a company inside it's jurisdiction like this...and giving free goods and services from that company to their government employees? Yeah,...no. The city YOU live in would also be scrutinized for this too.

I LOVE the firefighters...I really do!!!!....bud sadly,...this is bad optics no matter what city you live in.
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You mean like discounts that employees of Miami-Dade County are eligible to receive?

Miami-Dade Employee Discount

Or those of LA county?
LA County Employee Discounts

Both are partially funded by the local governments. In fact, nearly any organization can buy in.

Nothing nefarious, underhanded, illegal about it.
 
mkt

mkt

When a paradise is lost go straight to Disney™
Premium Member
Cliff said:
Good catch! You are right, it's on the boader.

@GCTales - At what what point do government perks or gifts or benifits with private companies become a problem? If this situation is not nefarious (and I'm OK with that) then at what point "can" it morph into that?

Where is the proper ethical line that should not be crossed between government and private business dealings?

(Again, I'm OK with these particular firefighters getting this perk...but I would be against the city of Orlando or Orange county or doing it or Anaheim...etc)

This "perk" thing can be a slippery sloap...or maybe not for some???
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I know you want there to be something nefarious going on, but there isn't: These are pretty standard benefits that employers offer to attract and retain talent.

If my employer - that's not based in Florida, and has no operations in Florida- can offer its employees deep DEEP discounts on Disney tickets that no one else can touch (short of giving free admission), then it makes sense to me that Reedy Creek should offer free or deeply discounted admission to its employees many of who work daily on Disney property (just like the many other employers that operate on the district)
 
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mikejs78

mikejs78

Well-Known Member
Cliff said:
Good catch! You are right, it's on the boader.

@GCTales - At what what point do government perks or gifts or benifits with private companies become a problem? If this situation is not nefarious (and I'm OK with that) then at what point "can" it morph into that?

Where is the proper ethical line that should not be crossed between government and private business dealings?

(Again, I'm OK with these particular firefighters getting this perk...but I would be against the city of Orlando or Orange county or doing it or Anaheim...etc)

This "perk" thing can be a slippery sloap...or maybe not for some???
Click to expand...
It doesn't. As long as the government entity is purchasing things available to other businesses, it's fine. Where it would be a problem is if a company *gave* something to the government (a gift) or gave discounts to a particular city or municipality if they were only available to that city or municipality.

In these cases, the governments (including Reedy Creek) are purchasing something for their employees that is available at the same rate to any business within the district that wants it.

The law is pretty clear on this. A perk that is purchased by the government is fine. A gift given by a company to a government is not.

You are free to believe that governments shouldn't be spending their money on this. That is legitimate political position. But there is nothing under handed, illegal, unethical about it by any standards that we have out there
 
JoeCamel

JoeCamel

Well-Known Member
Cliff said:
Good catch! You are right, it's on the boader.

@GCTales - At what what point do government perks or gifts or benifits with private companies become a problem? If this situation is not nefarious (and I'm OK with that) then at what point "can" it morph into that?

Where is the proper ethical line that should not be crossed between government and private business dealings?

(Again, I'm OK with these particular firefighters getting this perk...but I would be against the city of Orlando or Orange county or doing it or Anaheim...etc)

This "perk" thing can be a slippery sloap...or maybe not for some???
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How about if the g'mnt is purchasing uniforms for their employees to wear, are they allowed to choose which company they award the contract to? Who supplies the school lunch programs or any other thing they buy in the normal course of business? This is just another purchase the g'mnt choose to award their employees like a pay raise, time off etc. Just another expense and while Disney does sell tickets to this block they also don't play favorites who they sell to
 
mkt

mkt

When a paradise is lost go straight to Disney™
Premium Member
JoeCamel said:
Just another expense and while Disney does sell tickets to this block they also don't play favorites who they sell to
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It seems to be limited to entities that employ people on their property and within RCID as far as free admission goes.

However, they do offer discounted tickets to almost any employer through various programs.

If Disney were really struggling, they could offer slightly discounted payroll deducted APs as a work benefit to large local area employers, and honestly... I'd see that benefit being EXTREMELY popular.
 
Figgy1

Figgy1

Premium Member
mkt said:
So, and hear me out: what if in a specific jurisdiction, the single largest taxpayer which represents close to 90% of all tax revenues agrees to spending on one specific benefit for the public employees of that jurisdiction?
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As I've said before, I've been following the meetings since this mess started and have yet to hear anything from the other tax payers complaining about this
 

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