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

[pdude81]

The bonds are municipal bonds, so they could only be transferred to another municipal entity. In this case, FL law seems to require that they fall on the counties. Even if they can create another special district to take over the bonds, what's the point? It's a lot of money spent dissolving 1 entity to create another similar entity to do the same things. Why?

Why? Because we like you

 

[GoofGoof]

The bonds are municipal bonds, so they could only be transferred to another municipal entity. In this case, FL law seems to require that they fall on the counties. Even if they can create another special district to take over the bonds, what's the point? It's a lot of money spent dissolving 1 entity to create another similar entity to do the same things. Why?

Easy answer….this whole thing is a political stunt so the politicians get to save face. They claim they dissolved Disney’s special district and are forcing them to pay their fair share and then they just fail to mention that it was replaced with a new district that does the same thing and Disney is paying virtually the same in. Disney gets to continue operating business as usual and the politicians get to claim they won.

 

[peter11435]

The bonds are municipal bonds, so they could only be transferred to another municipal entity. In this case, FL law seems to require that they fall on the counties. Even if they can create another special district to take over the bonds, what's the point? It's a lot of money spent dissolving 1 entity to create another similar entity to do the same things. Why?

That’s the real question that anyone who supports this bill or DeSantis needs to ask/answer. Why? Why do any of this? What is the point? The answer should be a huge flag.

 

[Chip Chipperson]

Um, doesn't The Walt Disney Corporation have the ability to purchase bonds issued by RCID?

So, if RCID issuing new bonds and having acting open bonds in existence provides some benefit to RCID and those governed by RCID, then I can imagine there is at least one buyer willing to buy the bonds.

Perhaps. In that scenario, however, I could see the State trying to sue to prevent the bonds from being issued under the premise that RCID knows the State intends to dissolve it. Although that might actually lead to a speedier resolution of this mess, so maybe it's not out of the realm of possibility - but the downside is that it gives DeSantis and his cronies some ammo to tell their followers that "greedy woke Disney" is trying to skirt the law, so there's a perception risk involved if nothing else.

 

[mmascari]

The fact of the matter is Disney really doesn’t need to do anything here. The state has put itself in a no win situation and will essentially need to ask Disney to negotiate an agreement. They could just say no and then the dent and the service cost goes to the county, but it’s in Disney’s best interest to negotiate. Of course they won’t say yes unless it’s financially beneficial. I could see them negotiating a “new“ special district but then making sure there are clauses the ensure that the state cannot weaponize it against them in the future. Like a poison pill type payout if the state attempts to dissolve the district without Disney’s consent.

This is exactly what I think happens. The state cannot necessarily dictate the terms but the politicians need to save face so they “dissolve“ the existing district, take their victory lap on slapping down woke Disney and then a new district is established that gives Disney largely the same benefits. In order to get Disney to play along they will have to offer some assurance that this won’t happen again the next time Disney speaks out. Since the relationship is too broken to just rely on a handshake agreement I would expect some sort of financial windfall should the state go after the district again.

So the state created a no win situation, requires the primary impacted party to negotiate a solution that's better for the state than the current one they've voted into law already. The one with a firm deadline that's coming if nothing is done.

When Disney and a state representative sit down to talk, that's not a negotiation, it's a list of demands from Disney and the state saying yes. There's absolutely no reason that Disney couldn't get a BETTER district out of this.

The state can claim they got rid of RCID Classic, but replaced it with RCID New for some technical reasons. As nobody (not here) seems to understand what RCID Classic means, nobody is likely to understand what RCID New means either. Disney can get a better deal with more of whatever they want, and all they have to do is not publicize how much better RCID New is for Disney. As that would put pressure on the state to negotiate something different, which they don't have any leverage to do besides public opinion.

RCID New just like RCID Classic but it's even better for Disney.

 

[Animal_Kingdom_09]

He is a rather novice politician looking for fame…and at the end of the day - donations for campaigns and PACs…lucrative “consulting” jobs for the rest of his days.

Florida is not going to “stick it” to their biggest tax generator.

And again…it was done for cover of a gerrymander district map that’s going to get struck down in court anyway…

I am going to disagree with you on one point – this was actually a pretty astute move by DeSantis to get everyone to look away from the real issue.

TL DR – Reedy Creek isn’t going anywhere, this is a misdirection worthy of David Copperfield.

Going into the special session, the Legislature and the Governor were at odds over the redistricting maps. The Legislature, whose job it actually is to draw the map, had already drawn one that would most likely survive any State court challenges as well as survive any Federal challenges. That is actually a difficult exercise because you have three items at play – retaining incumbent Republicans in the delegation, passing muster with the Voting Rights Act, and conforming to the Florida Constitution, which contains a compact district amendment that passed with a super majority of voters.

The redistricting plan that DeSantis wanted would conform to the Florida Constitution but would be at odds with the Feds. His goal is to get the map into court and have the Florida compact districts amendment tossed, which also will be the demise of these types of laws/commissions in other states (at least for federal elections). The Legislature initially did not want to go along with it because of the bad optics, and there was a standoff in the special session.

Enter Disney from stage left (pun intended). Chapek threw DeSantis such a fat pitch that you have to wonder if it wasn’t a setup. Once Bob went on record for wanting to work on repealing the Parental Rights Act, DeSantis had his distraction, which the news cycle jumped all over. The only part of the special session that made the news in Florida was the “Disney is losing its tax break”, which isn’t even factually correct.

Conveniently, the law that was passed will almost certainly be overturned by the Florida Supreme Court on the grounds that the original law required Reedy Creek to remain in place as long as it had outstanding bond issues. The only way to disband the district is to legislatively take away its power to issue bonds, then let the outstanding bonds be paid off. There is no reason to go to Federal court, where the outcome is much less certain due to the question of Disney’s standing on a first amendment retaliation issue. Reedy Creek sues in State court, this will be fast tracked through the state courts with an injunction so that the affected counties don’t have to start spending money on preparations, and the status quo is maintained. The worst that happens is that the Legislature revokes the law in the May session, but I don’t think that will be needed.

Meanwhile, the redistricting map heads to the Supreme Court because it eliminates to minority districts, and the only way to eliminate the various laws limiting a state Legislature’s districting rights lands in DC with a 50/50 chance of being overturned. And, DeSantis never has to go on record as opposing the will of the voters on drawing district maps - he can just blame John Roberts.

 

[mmascari]

Perhaps. In that scenario, however, I could see the State trying to sue to prevent the bonds from being issued under the premise that RCID knows the State intends to dissolve it. Although that might actually lead to a speedier resolution of this mess, so maybe it's not out of the realm of possibility - but the downside is that it gives DeSantis and his cronies some ammo to tell their followers that "greedy woke Disney" is trying to skirt the law, so there's a perception risk involved if nothing else.

One of the Bob's relative's can make the purchase through a shell company.

For that matter, if it was really important to long term financial position of Disney, some retirement fund that owns lots of Disney stock could do it as a hedge to keep the main stock worth something.

The ways for this to get more and more messy is enormous compared to any that create a simple solution.

Other than the state simply reversing the bill they just passed, a massive undo, ctrl-z.

 

[Sirwalterraleigh]

I am going to disagree with you on one point – this was actually a pretty astute move by DeSantis to get everyone to look away from the real issue.

TL DR – Reedy Creek isn’t going anywhere, this is a misdirection worthy of David Copperfield.

Going into the special session, the Legislature and the Governor were at odds over the redistricting maps. The Legislature, whose job it actually is to draw the map, had already drawn one that would most likely survive any State court challenges as well as survive any Federal challenges. That is actually a difficult exercise because you have three items at play – retaining incumbent Republicans in the delegation, passing muster with the Voting Rights Act, and conforming to the Florida Constitution, which contains a compact district amendment that passed with a super majority of voters.

The redistricting plan that DeSantis wanted would conform to the Florida Constitution but would be at odds with the Feds. His goal is to get the map into court and have the Florida compact districts amendment tossed, which also will be the demise of these types of laws/commissions in other states (at least for federal elections). The Legislature initially did not want to go along with it because of the bad optics, and there was a standoff in the special session.

Enter Disney from stage left (pun intended). Chapek threw DeSantis such a fat pitch that you have to wonder if it wasn’t a setup. Once Bob went on record for wanting to work on repealing the Parental Rights Act, DeSantis had his distraction, which the news cycle jumped all over. The only part of the special session that made the news in Florida was the “Disney is losing its tax break”, which isn’t even factually correct.

Conveniently, the law that was passed will almost certainly be overturned by the Florida Supreme Court on the grounds that the original law required Reedy Creek to remain in place as long as it had outstanding bond issues. The only way to disband the district is to legislatively take away its power to issue bonds, then let the outstanding bonds be paid off. There is no reason to go to Federal court, where the outcome is much less certain due to the question of Disney’s standing on a first amendment retaliation issue. Reedy Creek sues in State court, this will be fast tracked through the state courts with an injunction so that the affected counties don’t have to start spending money on preparations, and the status quo is maintained. The worst that happens is that the Legislature revokes the law in the May session, but I don’t think that will be needed.

Meanwhile, the redistricting map heads to the Supreme Court because it eliminates to minority districts, and the only way to eliminate the various laws limiting a state Legislature’s districting rights lands in DC with a 50/50 chance of being overturned. And, DeSantis never has to go on record as opposing the will of the voters on drawing district maps - he can just blame John Roberts.

Fair…can’t argue that

 

[GoofGoof]

So the state created a no win situation, requires the primary impacted party to negotiate a solution that's better for the state than the current one they've voted into law already. The one with a firm deadline that's coming if nothing is done.

When Disney and a state representative sit down to talk, that's not a negotiation, it's a list of demands from Disney and the state saying yes. There's absolutely no reason that Disney couldn't get a BETTER district out of this.

The state can claim they got rid of RCID Classic, but replaced it with RCID New for some technical reasons. As nobody (not here) seems to understand what RCID Classic means, nobody is likely to understand what RCID New means either. Disney can get a better deal with more of whatever they want, and all they have to do is not publicize how much better RCID New is for Disney. As that would put pressure on the state to negotiate something different, which they don't have any leverage to do besides public opinion.

RCID New just like RCID Classic but it's even better for Disney.

Exactly my thoughts. The something better for Disney is a guarantee that the state won’t pull this again. Since there’s no verbal guarantee they can give that is worth anything at this point my thought is that the new district they setup will have a clause that says should the state want to terminate the district in the future they need to give X months or possibly years of notice and the company would be paid a breakup fee of $Y to compensate for legal fees and the administrative costs to switch away from the district. X and Y are the negotiation. Not whether they are in the bill but how many months/years on X and how many 0s for Y.

 

[Basil of Baker Street]

I am going to disagree with you on one point – this was actually a pretty astute move by DeSantis to get everyone to look away from the real issue.

TL DR – Reedy Creek isn’t going anywhere, this is a misdirection worthy of David Copperfield.

Going into the special session, the Legislature and the Governor were at odds over the redistricting maps. The Legislature, whose job it actually is to draw the map, had already drawn one that would most likely survive any State court challenges as well as survive any Federal challenges. That is actually a difficult exercise because you have three items at play – retaining incumbent Republicans in the delegation, passing muster with the Voting Rights Act, and conforming to the Florida Constitution, which contains a compact district amendment that passed with a super majority of voters.

The redistricting plan that DeSantis wanted would conform to the Florida Constitution but would be at odds with the Feds. His goal is to get the map into court and have the Florida compact districts amendment tossed, which also will be the demise of these types of laws/commissions in other states (at least for federal elections). The Legislature initially did not want to go along with it because of the bad optics, and there was a standoff in the special session.

Enter Disney from stage left (pun intended). Chapek threw DeSantis such a fat pitch that you have to wonder if it wasn’t a setup. Once Bob went on record for wanting to work on repealing the Parental Rights Act, DeSantis had his distraction, which the news cycle jumped all over. The only part of the special session that made the news in Florida was the “Disney is losing its tax break”, which isn’t even factually correct.

Conveniently, the law that was passed will almost certainly be overturned by the Florida Supreme Court on the grounds that the original law required Reedy Creek to remain in place as long as it had outstanding bond issues. The only way to disband the district is to legislatively take away its power to issue bonds, then let the outstanding bonds be paid off. There is no reason to go to Federal court, where the outcome is much less certain due to the question of Disney’s standing on a first amendment retaliation issue. Reedy Creek sues in State court, this will be fast tracked through the state courts with an injunction so that the affected counties don’t have to start spending money on preparations, and the status quo is maintained. The worst that happens is that the Legislature revokes the law in the May session, but I don’t think that will be needed.

Meanwhile, the redistricting map heads to the Supreme Court because it eliminates to minority districts, and the only way to eliminate the various laws limiting a state Legislature’s districting rights lands in DC with a 50/50 chance of being overturned. And, DeSantis never has to go on record as opposing the will of the voters on drawing district maps - he can just blame John Roberts.

Could be. I personally think its much simpler. He's counting on his party to support him but also a number of Democrats who are staunchly anti big corp/pro fair share. They are hard to find on these forums but they are out there.
edit: And of course retaliation

 

[mikejs78]

State of Florida does have an issue with existing bonds but future bonds could be curtailed.

Could not RCID be dissolved with exisiting bonds being transferred to a new entity, RCID Holdco, whose purpose is to administrate what was RCID until bond maturity without authority to issue new bonds?
1. Existing bonds are.not interfered with.
2. Bond accountability is not dumped on the counties.
3. WDW still retains ability to issue bonds for infrastructure improvement .

Based on the language, I don't think it could. The FL state legislature pledged, in contract, to not alter the powers of Reedy Creek. Even if they create a new district, that's not Reedy Creek and therefore is a breach of contract.

I am going to disagree with you on one point – this was actually a pretty astute move by DeSantis to get everyone to look away from the real issue.

TL DR – Reedy Creek isn’t going anywhere, this is a misdirection worthy of David Copperfield.

Going into the special session, the Legislature and the Governor were at odds over the redistricting maps. The Legislature, whose job it actually is to draw the map, had already drawn one that would most likely survive any State court challenges as well as survive any Federal challenges. That is actually a difficult exercise because you have three items at play – retaining incumbent Republicans in the delegation, passing muster with the Voting Rights Act, and conforming to the Florida Constitution, which contains a compact district amendment that passed with a super majority of voters.

The redistricting plan that DeSantis wanted would conform to the Florida Constitution but would be at odds with the Feds. His goal is to get the map into court and have the Florida compact districts amendment tossed, which also will be the demise of these types of laws/commissions in other states (at least for federal elections). The Legislature initially did not want to go along with it because of the bad optics, and there was a standoff in the special session.

Enter Disney from stage left (pun intended). Chapek threw DeSantis such a fat pitch that you have to wonder if it wasn’t a setup. Once Bob went on record for wanting to work on repealing the Parental Rights Act, DeSantis had his distraction, which the news cycle jumped all over. The only part of the special session that made the news in Florida was the “Disney is losing its tax break”, which isn’t even factually correct.

Conveniently, the law that was passed will almost certainly be overturned by the Florida Supreme Court on the grounds that the original law required Reedy Creek to remain in place as long as it had outstanding bond issues. The only way to disband the district is to legislatively take away its power to issue bonds, then let the outstanding bonds be paid off. There is no reason to go to Federal court, where the outcome is much less certain due to the question of Disney’s standing on a first amendment retaliation issue. Reedy Creek sues in State court, this will be fast tracked through the state courts with an injunction so that the affected counties don’t have to start spending money on preparations, and the status quo is maintained. The worst that happens is that the Legislature revokes the law in the May session, but I don’t think that will be needed.

Meanwhile, the redistricting map heads to the Supreme Court because it eliminates to minority districts, and the only way to eliminate the various laws limiting a state Legislature’s districting rights lands in DC with a 50/50 chance of being overturned. And, DeSantis never has to go on record as opposing the will of the voters on drawing district maps - he can just blame John Roberts.

I think though that this time he may have bitten off more than he can chew. This may be what ultimately comes back to bite him because it's potential to be so impactful without any real plan.

 

[lazyboy97o]

Exactly my thoughts. The something better for Disney is a guarantee that the state won’t pull this again. Since there’s no verbal guarantee they can give that is worth anything at this point my thought is that the new district they setup will have a clause that says should the state want to terminate the district in the future they need to give X months or possibly years of notice and the company would be paid a breakup fee of $Y to compensate for legal fees and the administrative costs to switch away from the district. X and Y are the negotiation. Not whether they are in the bill but how many months/years on X and how many 0s for Y.

There is absolutely no way people seeking censorial controls over Disney’s content are going to turn around and reinforce the status quo with guarantees. They’re the ones who will want guarantees of Disney, ones that are blatantly illegal. The promise of creating new districts is to offer an out for the collateral, it’s not a good faith offer to Disney.

 

[Figgy1]

Why? Because we like you

M O U S E

 

[GoofGoof]

What you’re describing is extortion design to suppress speech.

It’s a way out of this situation which benefits both sides. Disney could stand their ground and go to court and maybe even take it all the way to the Supreme Court on the 1st amendment basis and I understand why some people would want them to do that. I think what happened here is frightening and sets a terrible precedent. That’s an all or nothing play so if it works they get to keep doing business as usual but if it goes that route and Disney loses in court then they may lose the special district and inadvertently crush the taxpayers of Orange County unless they agree to just start paying for the services directly instead of through RCID. It’s anyone‘s guess what the odds are of success in court, but assuming it’s 50/50 or less those aren’t great odds. If the bill survives the courts and the taxpayers get screwed the bill sponsors and governor will just blame Disney it’s a PR nightmare. Disney is facing 2 choices: 1 where there’s a 50/50 shot they get what they want and one where it’s closer to 100%. They will take the sure thing.

For Disney they really just want to continue doing business as usual and they want the negative PR to die down. Even if it’s not a large number as a percentage of total customers there’s no reason to alienate anyone unnecessarily. If they allow the politicians to claim a bogus win they get to keep their special district and maybe even improve the financial guarantees around a future attempt to dissolve it. For the politicians, they don’t even know what RCID is or what it does so they don’t really care if it goes away. Before the carp hits the fan and the taxpayers start screaming bloody murder they get an out, but that’s why I think they will need to add a sweetener to get Disney to agree.

The only leverage the state has on Disney is approximately $500M of future tax incentives Disney has coming to them for various past projects including those 2,000 jobs they are moving to FL. The Governor did say this is only the first step and they are looking at all options when dealing with Disney and everything is on the table. Some have speculated the Governor was implying they will look to kill those incentives. I consider this another nuclear option as every staye offers tax incentives to get large employers to stay and/or bring in new jobs. If they went after those tax breaks (especially after the fact) that’s a huge red flag to other companies doing business in the state. It could have long term negative impacts to the state and local economies.

 

[Sirwalterraleigh]

One of unintended consequences of this is the business press has taken to talking about just how great these special districts are (of course…they’re pro-business)…

Bloomies even calling them “Vital”

As American as apple pie and teenagers doing stupid things.

So the PR of this will trend away from florida. Because they can’t even sell that Disney is “cheating taxes”…nor Do they want to go after them more and lie in public to try.

There are limits.

 

[Sirwalterraleigh]

M O U S E

…ok…knock that $@!? Off

 

[GoofGoof]

There is absolutely no way people seeking censorial controls over Disney’s content are going to turn around and reinforce the status quo with guarantees. They’re the ones who will want guarantees of Disney, ones that are blatantly illegal. The promise of creating new districts is to offer an out for the collateral, it’s not a good faith offer to Disney.

If that’s the case then they go down with the ship. It’s a no win situation for the state. They could certainly go that route but Disney has no incentive to play along. If Disney sits back and does absolutely nothing a little over a year from now they see a major drop in tax payments and they no longer have to pay back almost a billion in debt they would have paid through tax payments. They lose the ability to finance infrastructure projects off balance sheet but thats a longer term issue. The impact to the government and local taxpayers would be immediate.

 

[Vegas Disney Fan]

So the PR of this will trend away from florida. Because they can’t even sell that Disney is “cheating taxes”…not Do they want to go after them more and lie in public to try.

There are limits.

I think they’re counting on our short attention spans and the next “big story” to provide PR cover.

Desantis and the FL reps got their big ”loud” headline, they “took on” woke Disney, now they wait a few weeks for everyone to move on to the next story and quietly return everything to how it was behind closed doors.

Nothing changes except they get to campaign on the noise. Politics as usual, we’ve had the same half dozen hot button talking points my whole life, neither side ever fixes them even when they have supermajorities, without them they’d have nothing to use to vilify the other side, raise funds, and campaign on.

 

[GoofGoof]

I think they’re counting on our short attention spans and the next “big story” to provide PR cover.

Desantis and the FL reps got their big ”loud” headline, they “took on” woke Disney, now they wait a few weeks for everyone to move on to the next story and quietly return everything to how it was behind closed doors.

Nothing changes except they get to campaign on the noise. Politics as usual, we’ve had the same half dozen hot button talking points my whole life, neither side ever fixes them even when they have supermajorities, without them they’d have nothing to use to vilify the other side, raise funds, and campaign on.

Speaking of campaigning, they need to make up for the lost political donations from TWDC since almost all of the bill sponsors and the Gov himself took contributions from the mouse in the past 2 years. Having a hot button, social issue like this to whip up the base is a good way to drive up donations.

 

[lazyboy97o]

It’s a way out of this situation which benefits both sides. Disney could stand their ground and go to court and maybe even take it all the way to the Supreme Court on the 1st amendment basis and I understand why some people would want them to do that. I think what happened here is frightening and sets a terrible precedent. That’s an all or nothing play so if it works they get to keep doing business as usual but if it goes that route and Disney loses in court then they may lose the special district and inadvertently crush the taxpayers of Orange County unless they agree to just start paying for the services directly instead of through RCID. It’s anyone‘s guess what the odds are of success in court, but assuming it’s 50/50 or less those aren’t great odds. If the bill survives the courts and the taxpayers get screwed the bill sponsors and governor will just blame Disney it’s a PR nightmare. Disney is facing 2 choices: 1 where there’s a 50/50 shot they get what they want and one where it’s closer to 100%. They will take the sure thing.

For Disney they really just want to continue doing business as usual and they want the negative PR to die down. Even if it’s not a large number as a percentage of total customers there’s no reason to alienate anyone unnecessarily. If they allow the politicians to claim a bogus win they get to keep their special district and maybe even improve the financial guarantees around a future attempt to dissolve it. For the politicians, they don’t even know what RCID is or what it does so they don’t really care if it goes away. Before the carp hits the fan and the taxpayers start screaming bloody murder they get an out, but that’s why I think they will need to add a sweetener to get Disney to agree.

The only leverage the state has on Disney is approximately $500M of future tax incentives Disney has coming to them for various past projects including those 2,000 jobs they are moving to FL. The Governor did say this is only the first step and they are looking at all options when dealing with Disney and everything is on the table. Some have speculated the Governor was implying they will look to kill those incentives. I consider this another nuclear option as every staye offers tax incentives to get large employers to stay and/or bring in new jobs. If they went after those tax breaks (especially after the fact) that’s a huge red flag to other companies doing business in the state. It could have long term negative impacts to the state and local economies.

There are a number of legal issues with the legislation before you even get to the First Amendment. Multiple entities besides Disney and Reedy Creek have standing for these issues not to mention those related to the other districts that possibly have their own unique quirks. The First Amendment is the last resort, though one that those involved continued to reinforce with their own statements.