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

[Kamikaze]

The good news is the CFTOD just hired Guliani level talent that bills at Avenatti rates.

Rudy Giuliani was a good to great prosecutor/US Attorney when that was his job.

 

[CastAStone]

Hey, everyone. I think it's important we all take a breather and reflect on the one thing that has been revealed today. In fact, it's the only thing that I take away from this thread with over fifty thousand posts, and it's this:

England doesn't have a king.

I think all those posts were deleted.

 

[LSLS]

So, I may have missed it. It looks like this all came out because the board hired attorneys and brought it up in the public sphere that they had all their power taken away "Against the will of the voters" (which is freaking hilarious to say since the voters of the district had no say). Is this where everything originated, or did some journalist break this?

 

[Kamikaze]

So I was reading the Royal lives clause page on Wikipedia and noticed that on the sample clause there, it states "...21 years from the death of the last survivor of all the lineal descendants of [his late Majesty King George V or some other British monarch] who have been born on the date of this agreement."

The RCID King Charles III clause didn't have that. Instead, it says: "...until twenty one (21) years after the death of the last survivor of the descendants of King Charles III, King of England living as of the date of this Declaration." While I know it's a just sample and probably isn't used in legal practice, it's interesting that the clause didn't include similar wordage as the sample one. I'm no attorney/lawyer, but to me, this implies that the coverage of the clause not only spans the lifetimes of those in the recognized lineal line (William, Harry, George, Charlotte, Louis, Archie, and Lilibet) but also the ones outside the line (assuming that Charles III had secret illegitimate children who then had descendants of their own, albeit just unrecognized by the Royal Family because "dirty laundry").

If somehow the lineal line died out (either through wars, accidents, illness, ) and if there are people outside the lineal line who call Charles III a direct ascendant with valid proof (DNA testing, NDAs from RF, etc.), the clause will still hold. Knowing how protective RF is of their dirty laundry, CFTOD would have to move heaven and earth to find all unrecognized descendants and uh, liquidate them, just to gain full control of the property.

Clever move, Disney. Clever move.

(Now, I'm not saying that Charles III actually has illegitimate children, but wouldn't it be wild if he did...)

They (Disney's lawyer) purposely wrote it that way. Its a check on the prior 'perpetuity' clause in case that one gets struck down in court, because the legality of 'forever' is nebulous. This one would be probably 100+ years.

But yes, the other version is basically forever.

 

[Sir_Cliff]

Despite my earlier pedantry, even I have to acknowledge that the long-obsolete title (now misnomer) "King of England" somehow sounds much more natural than the current and actual title "King of Canada" (at least to non-Canadians).

Not so much to me, I'm afraid! Very used to hearing about 'the Queen of Australia' to try and make us all feel as though the monarchy was not some distant and indifferent institution.

 

[GBAB1973]

I am still chuckling at the one comment from Brian Aungst Jr that the Disney agreements were against "the will of the voter". LOL.

He's basically saying that the voters picked DeSantis and the legislature and therefore any move that goes against him (or them) and their authority is against the will of the voter. If that doesn't tell you this whole thing was nothing more than political retribution, nothing will.

 

[mikejs78]

Yes. But it's important to remember - a court is not typically in the business of determining if the arrangement itself is good or bad. They can get involved if the circumstances around the formation of the arrangement are sufficiently problematic enough to challenge the contract's enforceability. That (obviously) gets very complicated based on many, many circumstances. But, if a court says it's ok to enter into an agreement in xyz circumstances (in decided case law), it means, in theory, that can be done in the future in similar circumstances. And, judges will look to that "legacy".

That's true, and you do never truly know how a judge would rule. I think the more probable outcome is this would be upheld given the existing legislation, numerous examples of similar arrangements between local governments and private companies in FL, and prior case law regarding Reedy Creek in particular. Of course anything is possible and a judge who wants a specific outcome could find room here to throw out the contract.

I also think this is just the beginning of Disney's legal strategy, not the end. They have very good lawyers, and I suspect they have multiple contingencies depending on various outcomes, and numerous legal avenues to pursue. It is obvious that this caught DeSantis and his crew completely off guard, and I appreciate the legal maneuvering of Disney here, regardless of the ultimate outcome.

 

[Riviera Rita]

A bit off topic but does anyone know if the King has visited a Disney park?

I know Diana took William and Harry in the 90s and stayed at the GF but I can’t find anything to say King Charles has ever visited. With his interests in architecture and farming a visit to the land at Epcot or celebration would be a good fit at some point IMO.

Someone should contact Disney to tell them to offer him an invite to do an official visit and to bring the grandchildren with him. Not as daft as it sounds as many official visits begin with an invite.

 

[vikescaper]

Someone should contact Disney to tell them to offer him an invite to do an official visit and to bring the grandchildren with him. Not as daft as it sounds as many official visits begin with an invite.

They could even stay in the castle suite!

 

[vikescaper]

I’m not going to pretend that I know where this is heading but reading this thread yesterday put a smile on my face!

 

[Riviera Rita]

They could even stay in the castle suite!

Imagine the headlines with Charlotte meeting Aurora- A Princess meets a Princess.

 

[MisterPenguin]

All I can think of is Elenor in "The Lion In Winter" saying 'Now I've got you, got you' (If you've seen the film you can hear it in Katherine Hepburns voice. If you've never seen it --- do!)

Well, what governmental overreach doesn't have its ups and downs?

 

[MisterPenguin]

The semi-perpetuity clause is not meant to be forever forever, just a long enough time until the political pendulum provides a legislature that will undo this mess.

 

[GoofGoof]

I haven't dug into the details here so (seeing your occupation as well), I'm talking high level. But, while they normally would never carry weight outside of padding out your arguments in the initial claim/motions/briefs, we are starting to get into bad faith contracting, conflicts of interest, and (remote but possible) even tortious interference (assuming there was anything pending - not likely).

The most likely, rather, is a public policy argument. If there is a change pending of this nature with that level of attempted insulation and removal of power without ability to modify would set that up more than usual. Especially for development, as this could have much wider sweeping implications for other development situations. A court (especially one sympathetic to Desantis) could easily find the chilling effect there grounds on public policy to at least invalidate the term of this contract and inability for the future board to reclaim powers it would rightfully have via the establishment of the district.

Again, not saying these are likely to win. Rather, this is a tough ball (speaking nicely) usage of legal loopholes and capabilities. And, if those cases are decided in favor of "creativity" by big companies with major legal departments, I tend to find that does not benefit society at large very well down the line when that case law becomes precedence. And, while this would normally settle out of court 100% guaranteed, I wonder if this one may go all the way through given the public eye.

Legal nerding over. Please feel free to DM me if you'd like to chat more, without everyone else glazing over.

I’m not sure how this could be considered “removal of power”. It also wouldn’t apply to most other development situations as the local government wouldn’t have the same powers RCID had. In this case a local government entity freely and publicly entered into a legal contract with a corporation. Then control of said government entity was unilaterally seized by the governor for political purposes and the new appointed board is unhappy that the old board signed what they think is a bad contract. How could the court overturn this based on those grounds? The precedent would be set that anytime a company signs a contract or agreement with the government that contract could be overturned whenever new politicians took over with a different view point. That’s not something anyone wants. Remember the pendulum swings both ways.

 

[GoofGoof]

Yes. But it's important to remember - a court is not typically in the business of determining if the arrangement itself is good or bad. They can get involved if the circumstances around the formation of the arrangement are sufficiently problematic enough to challenge the contract's enforceability. That (obviously) gets very complicated based on many, many circumstances. But, if a court says it's ok to enter into an agreement in xyz circumstances (in decided case law), it means, in theory, that can be done in the future in similar circumstances. And, judges will look to that "legacy".

This is a good point. I think this situation is so unique it’s unlikely to come up much in the future. A government entity is unlikely to sign this type of contract “in bad faith” because there are very few examples where a corporation completely controls that entity.

 

[castlecake2.0]

Watching more and more clips of these new board members with their knickers in a knot yesterday makes me curious to what these people thought their job was going to actually be. Did they think their role was ever more than the mundane goings on of a local municipality? I keep seeing the one guy going on about “all we can do is road improvements and maintain infrastructure”. Yah! That’s the whole point. You’re not designing new parades and attractions or building new hotels, you’re making sure the trash gets picked up on time and the mosquito sprayer truck is making the rounds. It’s just hilarious to see how mad they are when they realized what a terribly boring job they have been given

 

[castlecake2.0]

Next question, is there anything protecting the cities of Bay Lake and Lake Buena Vista in these new documents?

 

[Zummi Gummi]

Watching more and more clips of these new board members with their knickers in a knot yesterday makes me curious to what these people thought their job was going to actually be. Did they think their role was ever more than the mundane goings on of a local municipality? I keep seeing the one guy going on about “all we can do is road improvements and maintain infrastructure”. Yah! That’s the whole point. You’re not designing new parades and attractions or building new hotels, you’re making sure the trash gets picked up on time and the mosquito sprayer truck is making the rounds. It’s just hilarious to see how mad they are when they realized what a terribly boring job they have been given

They 100% thought they were in a position to be able to stop “woke Disney.”

 

[castlecake2.0]

They 100% thought they were in a position to be able to stop “woke Disney.”

Really shows they did zero research in what the RCID actually was

 

[CastAStone]

The semi-perpetuity clause is not meant to be forever forever, just a long enough time until the political pendulum provides a legislature that will undo this mess.

It’s hard to imagine a future where either party intentionally gives that much power to a giant corporation again. But 30 years gives Disney a lot of time to plan / build Super Walt Disney World in Charleston and then Walt Disney World 64 in Knoxville