Monorail may be inspected by DOT if new bill gets passed

[bcla]

And doing so would then transfer the tax burden to the residents of Osceola and Orange counties. There was a loooooot of backlash to that suggestion.

They would have likely had to come close to the max mill rate on top of possibly having to cut county services and even services to Disney. Disney was already paying a higher mill rate to Reedy Creek on top of the same county mill rate where they weren't using many county services.

As someone who deals with consistent property taxes every year, I find what Florida does odd, where counties and special districts recalculate the property tax rate every year based on a projected budget.

 

[Dcgc28]

Disney was paying a ridiculous amount of taxes (I heard about 3x county taxes) on top of what they owed to Orange and Osceola Counties where they barely received any city or county services. The benefit they did get was that they were able to float municipal bonds with tax breaks to the bondholders. But otherwise they could have theoretically operated a lot of that infrastructure privately, such as privately run roads instead of district owned roads.

Still - I've followed this for some time and there is this frequent misunderstanding that somehow the Walt Disney Company was dodging taxes with the Reedy Creek Improvement District.

It's been misunderstood because Desantis is lying and saying they're not paying their fair share.

 

[sheilafri]

That would be one way to shock some! And they would have to send out a WARN notice that 70,000 Central Floridians will be laid off on that day. Hair on fire in the statehouse LOL

And another estimated 400,000 jobs created by the tourism. I know I wouldn’t go to Orlando if WDW wasn’t there. I suppose some people would go when the hotels have to really cut their rates to attract guests.

 

[Dcgc28]

I would hope that a business does not think it is above the law, and can't continue to do business on un-equal grounds giving it an unfair advantage against its competitors.

I have never been to universal, but they have been fighting on unequal terms all these years. It is not fair.

But it was cool until Disney disagreed with the state that one time.

It’s got nothing to do with an “unfair advantage” this take is so dated and old that it’s almost not even relevant anymore

 

[DSLRuser]

But it was cool until Disney disagreed with the state that one time.

It’s got nothing to do with an “unfair advantage” this take is so dated and old that it’s almost not even relevant anymore

blind love that Disney can do no wrong is "dated"

 

[BrianL]

blind love that Disney can do no wrong is "dated"

I don't think most of us here think "Disney can do no wrong." Far from it! I mean, the HarmonioUS barges....

Anyway, in THIS case, I think most of us feel that Disney is in the right as they have been clearly targeted for government retaliation solely because of things that their former CEO said. Honestly, that should bother anybody.

 

[tom1944]

blind love that Disney can do no wrong is "dated"

Blind love towards the other party involved here is also dated

 

[Sharene0724]

That's not really true though. While Disney did get benefit from managing their district themselves, that also came with a ton of costs and responsibilities. Universal does not have to manage roads and road maintenance, water retention, a fire department, etc. The deal was always mutually beneficial for both Disney and the state of Florida.

I agree and it's also worth noting that the State of Florida has over 1800 special districts with varying responsibilities. These are formed for that mutual benefit between the organization and the State of Florida. To accomplish "being fair" ALL special districts would have to be dissolved or ALL of them would have to be subject to the same rules and they are not because they have different purposes and fill different needs but again, all are intended to be mutually beneficial.

 

[Dcgc28]

blind love that Disney can do no wrong is "dated"

I would agree, but I didn't say or imply that so I'm also not sure how it's relevant.

 

[tom1944]

Nm

 

[TiggerBouncy]

Still - I've followed this for some time and there is this frequent misunderstanding that somehow the Walt Disney Company was dodging taxes with the Reedy Creek Improvement District.

I remember reading (not sure if it's true) that Disney could well end up paying less taxes without RCID - that RCID was not really an advantage for them in terms of finances (but it did let them navigate some red tape that would have slowed down construction).

Mostly though RCID was created as I understood it because Florida did not have the money at the time to finance all of the city services and roads and infrastructure required to support something the size and scope of WDW.

 

[bcla]

I remember reading (not sure if it's true) that Disney could well end up paying less taxes without RCID - that RCID was not really an advantage for them in terms of finances (but it did let them navigate some red tape that would have slowed down construction).

Mostly though RCID was created as I understood it because Florida did not have the money at the time to finance all of the city services and roads and infrastructure required to support something the size and scope of WDW.

It was a tradeoff, where Disney clearly had a favorable board where Disney was the majority landowner of RCID and votes were given by acreage owned. I was surprised that Disney isn't sole landowner in the district (other than land that they ceded to the district for fire stations, administration, roads, etc.). I heard it's about 89%. The only legal (citizen) voting residents in the district live in two small communities in the cities of Bay Lake and Lake Buena Vista, and they get to vote on the city councils, but where Disney determines who gets to live there.

But yeah - it would have been an economic disaster if all of that had reverted to the counties. There was also talk that with the dissolution of the district, that those two cities might also assert control over what would normally be city services. But they wouldn't have anything near the tax base. Disney was paying their normal share of county property taxes. But the the bargain they got was a certain amount of autonomy (where the board was likely to approve anything reasonable) but where they paid a ton for that privilege. If anything, it was fiscally responsible in a way that benefitted the economy and local taxpayers.

 

[RamblinWreck]

I would hope that a business does not think it is above the law, and can't continue to do business on un-equal grounds giving it an unfair advantage against its competitors.

I have never been to universal, but they have been fighting on unequal terms all these years. It is not fair.

I see many people say tgis

But none of them seem to have any idea what they are talking about.

 

[jerry557]

Why is this viewed as a bad thing? The monorails are not in the best of shape. Disney has neglected them. These current trains went into service in 1990 and had a 20 year designed lifespan. They are now over 30 years old. Doors continue to malfunction and I see cast members at times banging and pushing on them to close.

Last month someone got picture of a gaping hole and a crack in one of the cement support columns.

More state inspections will force Disney to finally start upgrading and fixing some of this stuff.

 

[Jarmo]

Why is this viewed as a bad thing? The monorails are not in the best of shape. Disney has neglected them. These current trains went into service in 1990 and had a 20 year designed lifespan. They are now over 30 years old. Doors continue to malfunction and I see cast members at times banging and pushing on them to close.

Last month someone got picture of a gaping hole and a crack in one of the cement support columns.

More state inspections will force Disney to finally start upgrading and fixing some of this stuff.

It's a hard topic to discuss without getting political, but the concern is the inspections won't be done in good faith and could be used as a punitive measure to force downtime at inconvenient times

 

[ChipnDale79]

blind love that Disney can do no wrong is "dated"

disney has done a lot of wrong, and i mean wrong.

Desantis is in the wrong here. Big time.

 

[HashberryOTG]

If it wasn't for Disney, I wouldn't go to Universal. Or any other of the local stores and restaurants. If local laws ended up taking so much away from Disney that I would no longer enjoy my vacation, I also wouldn't go to Florida.

 

[OKW Lover]

Why is this viewed as a bad thing? The monorails are not in the best of shape. Disney has neglected them. These current trains went into service in 1990 and had a 20 year designed lifespan. They are now over 30 years old. Doors continue to malfunction and I see cast members at times banging and pushing on them to close.

Last month someone got picture of a gaping hole and a crack in one of the cement support columns.

More state inspections will force Disney to finally start upgrading and fixing some of this stuff.

Monorails are subject to inspections already. You may think they are "old" and neglected, but they are not unsafe. Inspections look at safety issues.

 

[mdmost]

If it wasn't for Disney, I wouldn't go to Universal. Or any other of the local stores and restaurants. If local laws ended up taking so much away from Disney that I would no longer enjoy my vacation, I also wouldn't go to Florida.

I already made this declaration in a deleted thread. The vindictiveness of the Florida government has definitely made me decide we're no longer going to the state of Florida until they back off. We just got back from Universal Hollywood to do Super Nintendo Land and got us interested in going back to UO again. But honestly, I'm keeping my travel money in California with Disneyland and UH until Florida comes to its senses.

 

[Violetspider]

I already made this declaration in a deleted thread. The vindictiveness of the Florida government has definitely made me decide we're no longer going to the state of Florida until they back off. We just got back from Universal Hollywood to do Super Nintendo Land and got us interested in going back to UO again. But honestly, I'm keeping my travel money in California with Disneyland and UH until Florida comes to its senses.

If it wasn’t for my nephew’s DVC contract at WDW, and my getting to stay with his family for free each summer, my Disney dollars would be spent at DLR and/or DLP for the foreseeable future.