lazyboy97o
Well-Known Member
They already have. The district stalling on the requested depositions is part of why the continuance was granted.
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News Reedy Creek Improvement District and the Central Florida Tourism Oversight District
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drnilescrane
Well-Known Member
Update from the Orlando Sentinel on the cash stipend as a replacement for park passes/discounts for district firefighters.
"Unionized firefighters are waiting to receive cash stipends to make up for Disney perks ended by Gov. Ron DeSantis’ tourism oversight district.
About 200 unionized employees – more than half of the district’s workforce – haven’t gotten the $3,000 stipend because of a disagreement with the district over the benefit’s value, said Jon Shirey, president of the district’s firefighters union.
“We have had one bargaining session over the stipend, but it went nowhere,” he said.
The deadlock comes as administrator Glen Gilzean touts increased employee morale at the Central Florida Tourism Oversight District made possible through his “open door” policy and additional benefits. More than 40 of the district’s roughly 370 employees have resigned or retired since the state seized control in February.
The district’s board approved the stipend at their meeting in September.
“Under the current contract, the district cannot provide additional benefits without renegotiating the contract,” said Alexei Woltornist, a district spokesman. “Contract negotiations are currently underway, and we cannot comment further at this time.”
Union officials estimated the value of the Disney passes and discounts to be at least $5,000. The Disney perks program covered theme park entry for employees, their spouses and three guests, an employee familiar with the benefit said. The program also included discounts at Disney restaurants and hotels.
DeSantis’ hand-picked tourism oversight board took aim at the perk, calling it an “unethical” arrangement that exclusively benefited Disney over other businesses. But the board faced a backlash from some employees who said the theme park passes were a key factor in their decision to work there.
At this month’s meeting, Gilzean said employees would get two additional paid holidays — Veterans Day and the day before Thanksgiving — when outlining his efforts to boost employee morale. Those days are also subject to bargaining, so union members aren’t presently eligible for those paid holidays, Shirey said.
The Reedy Creek Professional Firefighters, the union led by Shirey, endorsed DeSantis’ re-election bid with the district’s future still in question. Formerly known as Reedy Creek, the Central Florida Tourism Oversight District provides fire protection and other government services to Disney World.
Union officials praised DeSantis when he appointed the new board earlier this year. Shirey accused the previous Disney-friendly board and management of neglecting public safety by not addressing staffing and equipment shortages.
The new administration approved a union contract in July, ending about five years of negotiations and answering the governor’s calls to boost the pay of Disney World’s emergency workers.
Starting pay for a firefighter/paramedic will increase from $55,000 to $66,000 as part of the three-year agreement.
At their November meeting, board members approved a separate union contract covering battalion chiefs and captains that includes a 13% wage adjustment in 2024 and a 5% adjustment in 2025 and 2026."
www.orlandosentinel.com
"Unionized firefighters are waiting to receive cash stipends to make up for Disney perks ended by Gov. Ron DeSantis’ tourism oversight district.
About 200 unionized employees – more than half of the district’s workforce – haven’t gotten the $3,000 stipend because of a disagreement with the district over the benefit’s value, said Jon Shirey, president of the district’s firefighters union.
“We have had one bargaining session over the stipend, but it went nowhere,” he said.
The deadlock comes as administrator Glen Gilzean touts increased employee morale at the Central Florida Tourism Oversight District made possible through his “open door” policy and additional benefits. More than 40 of the district’s roughly 370 employees have resigned or retired since the state seized control in February.
The district’s board approved the stipend at their meeting in September.
“Under the current contract, the district cannot provide additional benefits without renegotiating the contract,” said Alexei Woltornist, a district spokesman. “Contract negotiations are currently underway, and we cannot comment further at this time.”
Union officials estimated the value of the Disney passes and discounts to be at least $5,000. The Disney perks program covered theme park entry for employees, their spouses and three guests, an employee familiar with the benefit said. The program also included discounts at Disney restaurants and hotels.
DeSantis’ hand-picked tourism oversight board took aim at the perk, calling it an “unethical” arrangement that exclusively benefited Disney over other businesses. But the board faced a backlash from some employees who said the theme park passes were a key factor in their decision to work there.
At this month’s meeting, Gilzean said employees would get two additional paid holidays — Veterans Day and the day before Thanksgiving — when outlining his efforts to boost employee morale. Those days are also subject to bargaining, so union members aren’t presently eligible for those paid holidays, Shirey said.
The Reedy Creek Professional Firefighters, the union led by Shirey, endorsed DeSantis’ re-election bid with the district’s future still in question. Formerly known as Reedy Creek, the Central Florida Tourism Oversight District provides fire protection and other government services to Disney World.
Union officials praised DeSantis when he appointed the new board earlier this year. Shirey accused the previous Disney-friendly board and management of neglecting public safety by not addressing staffing and equipment shortages.
The new administration approved a union contract in July, ending about five years of negotiations and answering the governor’s calls to boost the pay of Disney World’s emergency workers.
Starting pay for a firefighter/paramedic will increase from $55,000 to $66,000 as part of the three-year agreement.
At their November meeting, board members approved a separate union contract covering battalion chiefs and captains that includes a 13% wage adjustment in 2024 and a 5% adjustment in 2025 and 2026."
Reedy Creek firefighters don’t yet have cash replacement for Disney passes
Unionized firefighters are still waiting to receive cash stipends to make up for Disney perks ended by Gov. Ron DeSantis’ tourism oversight district.
www.orlandosentinel.com
UNCgolf
Well-Known Member
I just looked at the actual requests and some of them are a little silly -- mainly because they're likely going to get a ton of junk they don't actually care about. I wouldn't be surprised if they then turn around and complain that Disney gave them a bunch of junk and are acting in bad faith when it's actually what they requested.
They're asking for all communications, internal and external, that mention Ron DeSantis, the two Senate bills, or the House bill, and as well as all communications with the different media outlets. They could end up with thousands of listserv newsletter type emails from various companies that mention DeSantis or one of the bills -- that's all dependent on who the Disney custodians are (and how many there are) but anything like that would technically be responsive to the document requests. The request relating to the media communications could (and likely would) bring in loads of emails that relate to standard Disney operations/marketing and have nothing to do with the issues at hand.
Being overly broad isn't only burdensome to the party making the productions -- it also makes things more difficult for the party receiving the productions. They have to dig through all of the junk that's not remotely relevant to the case to identify documents that are actually useful.
Requests 13 and 14 are likely to be blanket privileged and they probably won't actually see a single document from those requests. They'll just end up on a privilege log.
Finally, I noticed they're asking to categorize every produced document by request number. That's something we generally only do for certain government investigations; it slows down the process significantly to have document reviewers potentially place numerous categorization tags on each document, since some could be responsive to multiple requests. Disney may just mass categorize them on the back end based on which search terms were used to bring in the documents (or another similar process), which won't be that accurate but is much faster/simpler.
They're asking for all communications, internal and external, that mention Ron DeSantis, the two Senate bills, or the House bill, and as well as all communications with the different media outlets. They could end up with thousands of listserv newsletter type emails from various companies that mention DeSantis or one of the bills -- that's all dependent on who the Disney custodians are (and how many there are) but anything like that would technically be responsive to the document requests. The request relating to the media communications could (and likely would) bring in loads of emails that relate to standard Disney operations/marketing and have nothing to do with the issues at hand.
Being overly broad isn't only burdensome to the party making the productions -- it also makes things more difficult for the party receiving the productions. They have to dig through all of the junk that's not remotely relevant to the case to identify documents that are actually useful.
Requests 13 and 14 are likely to be blanket privileged and they probably won't actually see a single document from those requests. They'll just end up on a privilege log.
Finally, I noticed they're asking to categorize every produced document by request number. That's something we generally only do for certain government investigations; it slows down the process significantly to have document reviewers potentially place numerous categorization tags on each document, since some could be responsive to multiple requests. Disney may just mass categorize them on the back end based on which search terms were used to bring in the documents (or another similar process), which won't be that accurate but is much faster/simpler.
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This makes sense considering the district's leadership has every incentive to drag this out as long as possible and there's no costs for them to do so.
Batman'sParents
Active Member
Without the added discounts or passes, is working as a firefighter or EMT for CFTOD still attractive?Update from the Orlando Sentinel on the cash stipend as a replacement for park passes/discounts for district firefighters.
"Unionized firefighters are waiting to receive cash stipends to make up for Disney perks ended by Gov. Ron DeSantis’ tourism oversight district.
About 200 unionized employees – more than half of the district’s workforce – haven’t gotten the $3,000 stipend because of a disagreement with the district over the benefit’s value, said Jon Shirey, president of the district’s firefighters union.
“We have had one bargaining session over the stipend, but it went nowhere,” he said.
The deadlock comes as administrator Glen Gilzean touts increased employee morale at the Central Florida Tourism Oversight District made possible through his “open door” policy and additional benefits. More than 40 of the district’s roughly 370 employees have resigned or retired since the state seized control in February.
The district’s board approved the stipend at their meeting in September.
“Under the current contract, the district cannot provide additional benefits without renegotiating the contract,” said Alexei Woltornist, a district spokesman. “Contract negotiations are currently underway, and we cannot comment further at this time.”
Union officials estimated the value of the Disney passes and discounts to be at least $5,000. The Disney perks program covered theme park entry for employees, their spouses and three guests, an employee familiar with the benefit said. The program also included discounts at Disney restaurants and hotels.
DeSantis’ hand-picked tourism oversight board took aim at the perk, calling it an “unethical” arrangement that exclusively benefited Disney over other businesses. But the board faced a backlash from some employees who said the theme park passes were a key factor in their decision to work there.
At this month’s meeting, Gilzean said employees would get two additional paid holidays — Veterans Day and the day before Thanksgiving — when outlining his efforts to boost employee morale. Those days are also subject to bargaining, so union members aren’t presently eligible for those paid holidays, Shirey said.
The Reedy Creek Professional Firefighters, the union led by Shirey, endorsed DeSantis’ re-election bid with the district’s future still in question. Formerly known as Reedy Creek, the Central Florida Tourism Oversight District provides fire protection and other government services to Disney World.
Union officials praised DeSantis when he appointed the new board earlier this year. Shirey accused the previous Disney-friendly board and management of neglecting public safety by not addressing staffing and equipment shortages.
The new administration approved a union contract in July, ending about five years of negotiations and answering the governor’s calls to boost the pay of Disney World’s emergency workers.
Starting pay for a firefighter/paramedic will increase from $55,000 to $66,000 as part of the three-year agreement.
At their November meeting, board members approved a separate union contract covering battalion chiefs and captains that includes a 13% wage adjustment in 2024 and a 5% adjustment in 2025 and 2026."
Reedy Creek firefighters don’t yet have cash replacement for Disney passes
Unionized firefighters are still waiting to receive cash stipends to make up for Disney perks ended by Gov. Ron DeSantis’ tourism oversight district.
I would want to know how wages compare to the city of Orlando and Orange County. If you don't have the passes anymore, you may as well go where you can make more.
I know that for some odd reason firefighters who work for the City of Tampa have really good wages and retirements.
Records show DeSantis plotted more punishment for Disney
But the governor and Legislature abandoned the plan — which would have also disturbed another big campaign donor.
jasongarcia.substack.com
lazyboy97o
Well-Known Member
A nice bit of evidence to support some of the broad discovery requests made by Disney. This isn’t the first time the governor’s office has been caught trying to dodge public record laws.Records show DeSantis plotted more punishment for Disney
But the governor and Legislature abandoned the plan — which would have also disturbed another big campaign donor.
Rhinocerous
Premium Member
Okay thanks. As I said, I don’t know how these things usually go.
Stripes
Premium Member
Some of the facts are obvious on their face but it’s not clear how the district has standing to bring such claims. For instance, clearly the district and Disney signed a contract giving Disney development rights within the cities of BL and LBV. Those development rights, at the time, were not under the district’s control. They were under the control of cities (however the development rights are now under the control of the district).
The cities were harmed by the contract, not the district. It is unclear how the district has standing to challenge the contracts because the cities were harmed.
I suspect that the current board is mostly interested in a lengthy expensive process. They’re running the place in the meantime and everyone makes money while they wreak as much havoc as possible. No matter what happens in the end, they walk away unscathed and Disney foots the bill for the whole ugly process.
I think the district was designated to deal with planning for all 3 entities. IIRC this was referenced in the cities’ amendments to conform to the new Comprehensive Plan.
One of the district’s arguments is that the cities didn’t agree to the DA, but I can’t remember how Disney responded to that point. Disney did, however, point out that the district was required to join the cities in the lawsuit.
IMO the most interesting question in the “who can sue who” debate is the reality that the district now is legally the same entity as the district then. Many of their arguments boil down to accusing themselves of sloppy/negligent/corrupt conduct. (There’s also the side issue of other “affected property owners” but it seems unlikely that they’d have a viable argument there, even if they had standing to sue on behalf of those owners.)
lazyboy97o
Well-Known Member
The development agreements have to tie to an existing comprehensive plan. The cities delegated their planning to the District and that is who maintained the comprehensive plan.
I imagine they’re looking for two things: 1) evidence that they were trying to subvert the legislature and 2) evidence of their acting in a political manner. They’re probably hoping to find someone referencing any of the stories shared here about what DeSantis was planning to do as a smoking gun that they were trying to subvert the legislation at the 11th hour.
drnilescrane
Well-Known Member
Plus Disney's shown their hand here by suggesting that they have restrictive covenants with all the other property owners.
There are no other affected property owners - they had no development rights to begin with.
That blows up some of the more technical arguments the district is making.
drnilescrane
Well-Known Member
God help us all if a Judge agrees that the agreements are a legitimate violation of public policy, considering the legislature introduced and passed said legislation within 72 hours.
Yup. Based on their request for production of deed restrictions or restrictive covenants I’d say they’ve finally (kind of) clued in to this issue and they’d like Disney to do their homework for them.
And I’d bet that legislation was written in direct response to the Development Agreeement that was already in the process of being approved by RCID. Will discovery turn up some communication(s) that confirm this?
but I wouldn’t be surprised.